So let's go back two decades and look at New York. At that time, they enacted two key provisions of ObamaCare: Insurance companies could not refuse coverage because of pre-existing conditions (guaranteed issue provision) and they could not vary premiums based upon the age or health of the insured (pure community rating provision). Three years later they enacted another law that required all HMO's to offer a comprehensive, standardized package of benefits.
These are the kinds of "compassionate" provisions that ObamaCare is filled with, right? So, what has happened in New York?
The law allowed consumers to buy insurance after they became sick with only a relatively short waiting period. They could also drop it when they no longer needed it.
The New York insurance market did not collapse, as some insurers had warned. But in the ensuing years, more older and sicker New Yorkers bought individual health plans. And premiums shot upward.
Since 2001, the average premiums for a health plan on the individual market in New York has nearly tripled, according to the state Insurance Department. In some counties, it is impossible to buy an individual plan for less than $12,000 a year.
Although New York has higher medical costs than many states, its premiums still outpace other high-cost states.
An informal survey by America's Health Insurance Plans, an industry group, showed that average premiums in New York last year were more than twice those in California and Florida, two other high-cost states.
Of course, PresBo wants to offset this obvious liability with the "individual mandate"... a provision that is most likely unconstitutional in nature.
But with premiums continuing to climb, the market regulations are increasingly becoming an empty promise, said Scherzer, the consumer attorney. "You have to be incredibly sick to make it worthwhile," he said.
Obama and congressional Democrats tried to head off the problem confronting New York by including a requirement in their healthcare legislation that nearly all Americans buy insurance.
This so-called insurance mandate alone would not guarantee lower premiums, many experts concede. Insurance rates in Massachusetts, which included a mandate in its landmark insurance overhaul in 2006, remain relatively high.
This article is making the point that PresBo's "individual mandate" is necessary to control costs, but to do so it makes the case of all those who oppose ObamaCare. The core provisions of ObamaCare would drive up insurance costs, and the "subsidies" that the Democrats are offering with the mandate would increase spending and our national debt.
It's a bad deal, people. Shouldn't we learn from the mistakes of others? These kinds of laws do NOT make things better... they just create a different kind of "worst."
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