Another Brick in the Wall of Socialism

Well, if Romney and I agree on one thing, it’s that Obama’s mandatory health insurance law is bad.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

“What the court did not do I will do on my first day as president,” Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said. “ObamaCare was bad policy yesterday. It’s bad policy today.”

Thanks to the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling in favor of ObamaCare, here’s what you (and all business owners) get to look forward to in early 2015:

People must show when they file tax returns for 2014 that they had coverage during that year or pay a tax penalty. The size of the penalty will rise over time and eventually reach a maximum of several thousand dollars a year.

Also starting in 2014, employers with more than 50 workers will have to pay penalties starting at $2,000 per employee if they didn’t offer a set level of health benefits.

I assume the IRS will assume the responsibility for enforcing the mandatory health insurance law and penalizing those in non-compliance.

So the IRS will become bigger and scarier than it already is.

What’s more, health insurance providers will be required to accept all customers regardless of their health histories.

This means one of two things:

1. People who are unhealthy will be forced to pay astronomical insurance premiums. If they are unable to afford these premiums, they will by default have to pay the penalty for not having health insurance.

2. OR – Insurance rates will rise for all people in good health to cover the costs of people in bad health.

Other potential repercussions:

• Small private businesses may reduce salaries, lay-off employees, or make cuts in other places to afford the involuntary expense of providing health benefits to employees.

• Reimbursements paid to doctors by health insurance providers may decline — causing the most-skilled doctors to leave the U.S. Many doctors have already stated they would rather work for free (or much-reduced rates) in a third-world country than deal with the heavy burden of regulation.

• As doctors leave the country, we may see an uptick in “medical tourism” — patients flying to other countries to get the best care possible at the lowest possible rates.

• Long wait times for important medical procedures. Patients in Canada already know what this is like. You may have to wait three months or longer just to get a CAT scan. Even then, you’re assigned a time — which could be in the middle of the night. (They run their outdated medical equipment 24/7 and still can’t meet demand.)

Government makes a big inefficient mess of almost everything it touches.

Don’t expect health care to be any different.

In the mean time, you might want to start planning for how you’re going to pay higher insurance premiums and potential penalties for non-compliance.

Learning how to sell in print would be a great way to start:

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-Ryan M. Healy