Don't get sidetracked by the mandate debate (Concord Monitor)

[jefferson_dem]

Don't get sidetracked by the mandate debate
Monitor staff

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December 07. 2007 12:40AM

The great health care mandate debate is a sideshow. Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and John Edwards insist that forcing individuals to buy a policy is crucial to providing universal health care or something close to it. Rival Barack Obama disagrees. A mandate may be necessary to force those who refuse to sign up once affordable options are available, he says, but that step should come at the end of the march to universal care, not at the beginning.

The debate has degenerated into arguments over who is or isn't being honest with voters. The question voters should focus on is which candidate, if elected, can convince enough Republicans - who will use words like "confiscation" to describe any mandate - to go along with a plan. The next question should be: Is this plan the best and most affordable path to universal coverage?

On the honesty question, when it comes to health care mandates, the edge goes to Obama. He rightly says they force people to buy something before they know what it will cost and how good it will be, and many won't comply.

A mandate could make insurance cheaper for everyone by forcing the young and healthy, a group that traditionally opts out of the system, to sign up. But making people buy insurance before good plans are affordable could lead more people to ignore the mandate. A mandate to buy insurance before much more is done to make it affordable would also mean even higher profits for insurance companies and bigger government subsidies to make coverage affordable.

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Government mandates have been used to force people to buy auto insurance, immunize their children, pay child support and pay workers a minimum wage. But compliance rates, according to the journal Health Affairs, are far from universal; just 77 to 85 percent for immunization and 30 percent for child support. Some studies have found that despite mandates, about 20 percent of people still don't buy auto insurance, which is why the rest have to pay extra to guard against uninsured motorists.

<SNIP>

As for Clinton, it's easy to see why she hasn't been specific about how her plan would punish people who ignore the mandate. Far better that that particular club be crafted by a bipartisan team in Congress. But it's hard to see how Clinton or Edwards can describe their plans as covering everyone. Mandates, as their track record has proven, fall far short of guaranteeing universal participation.

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[killbotfactory]

1. Obama is 100% right

No mandates until fundamental changes are made. Put mandates on the table, and that's the only thing the health insurance lobby will allow, while fighting tooth and nail to undermine everything else.

The result will be like the debacle Romney started. People will be forced into expensive plans that don't cover a damn thing, or be fined. That's not a choice, it's extortion.

[Progress And Change]

2. that isn't Obama's position

"Obama is 100% right
Posted by killbotfactory
No mandates until fundamental changes are made."

Obama supports mandates for millions of parents.