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ince being introduced to legislation in 2010, there has been resistance to the Affordable Care Act, dubbed “Obamacare,” by opposing media. It’s a national health care plan aimed to regulate the health insurance industry and discrimination toward those needing proper coverage. If you have pre-existing conditions, you cannot be turned away. If you make up the bracket of low-income Americans, you’re able to take advantage of the Medicaid expansion.
Whether it’s from state representatives choosing not to cover their low-income residents, or those who see the act as the government being forced upon them and working to rid of its progress, questions of “why” have arisen. Is a national system that bad? Who is going to, literally, pay the price? These are questions that many young people should be asking, due to the fact that if a person is up to 26 old, he or she is able to stay under a parent’s health insurance plan. From then on out, they will indefinitely be covered, whether it is by Obamacare or another insurer, or else legal consequences will ensue.
For many college students, money is an issue. During college, and even after graduation, concerns about health and means of preventative action are not always of immediate concern. People will sometimes wait until they are ill or reach an age where they will have a higher chance of being exposed to certain health issues and then purchase their insurance. This demand has allowed many insurance companies to implement high rates for those in their 50s and beyond.
Young adults, ideally, should be securing a job and therefore opting for the company’s plan, or staying under their parents’ plan until their cutoff period. However, the problem is that with a competitive job market, young adults are often not finding work that will cover their health insurance.
But health insurance mandates have required people to find an approved private insurance policy, to be covered under their employer or to reach out to the public insurance programs after reaching 26. This is not including the option of being waived for religious reasons or serious financial disadvantage.
Some citizens believe a forced health care plan is unconstitutional. A counter-argument as to whether or not this mandate is truly forcing young adults to choose, as this is something that should benefit the general welfare, in regards to a 2010 ruling during the case of Cuccinelli II v. Sebelius in Virginia has been raised. The trial basically ruled that what is good for everyone should be considered “good.”
Around here, there are some that don’t think so. A student at Elizabethtown College, who wished to remain anonymous, sees the entire cost of Obamacare as burden.
“…to provide the benefits [Obamacare] promotes, Americans are going to have to pay more taxes, and eventually the additional taxes will become a burden to the public. As college students, soon graduating and entering the work force we will have to deal with paying the additional taxes…”
Regarding taxes, Dr. Dimitry Krichevskiy, assistant professor of economics, sees the need for force: “We have to force certain things. Preventative care is free now … [we] don’t have to wait for it to get severe and then insurance makes it hard for costs to be covered.”
These costs are not only limited to taking care of the price tag of more than one trillion dollars for spending, but includes the premium rates for the elderly, and the number of specialty procedures fighting to be put under mandates within a state.
Though the cost of this reform is not cheap, do the benefits outweigh the costs? Krichevskiy said that the hindrance on young adults may not be as bad as it seems. He reminded me that taxing is how we pay for social security, Medicaid and other federal programs, and that these same programs, along with the introduction of income tax, American citizens echoed a similar resistance. “The reform is not exactly what I wanted to see,” Krichevskiy said. “But it’s a compromise, a bit in between.”
If everything is met according to its proposal, Krichevskiy also believes that the Act will not be a burden on small businesses, as the option to be covered under Obamacare could allow for freer reign in young adults creating their own businesses, and negotiating their own allowances for coverage policies. The Centers for Disease Control reported in 2012 that on a national status, with the young adults who are now covered, the number of uninsured adults dropped more than one-sixth, the largest decline since insurance data rates were collected in 1997. It may seem as though the benefit lies with the older crowd, but there is always a long-term benefit with early health action: a longer life.
There is no certainty of how things will look within the next five to ten years. In my opinion, reforms such as immigration and education are needed, as well as a chance for getting to the middle class and a steady job, are all issues to consider. Regardless, one thing is clear: stressed and unhealthy people being continually cast aside may not leave many left to truly uphold the liberties the United States should grant its citizens. All of them.