Supreme Court releases healthcare ruling [pdf] | Hacker News Reader

Supreme Court releases healthcare ruling [pdf]

supremecourt.gov

14 pointsCWuestefeld3 comments

Although some may argue the relevance of this ruling to readers of HN, thank you for posting the link to the PDF. Effectively, it comes down to this: (1) buy health insurance and pay lower taxes; or (2) don't buy health insurance and pay higher taxes. You can't refuse to purchase health insurance and refuse to pay higher taxes. This is relevant, because of the potentially adverse impact it will have on small businesses.

The dissent nails it: this act eviscerates the actuarial analysis many young, healthy people use to decide whether to purchase health insurance by compelling them to subsidize health insurance of the population. This occurs because the Act binds the hands of insurers: they can't use any health characteristics of those that that they insure in deciding their premium. Ultra-healthy individuals will not be entitled to lower premiums, which is to say that the active and healthy 50-something will pay the same insurance premium as the sedentary, overweight 50-something with diabetes.

Politics aside, the Supreme Court made it clear that the USA is not a welfare state (they didn't believe the government's arguments that this was legal under the Commerce Clause or Necessary and Proper Clause), and instead upheld the mandate because of a tenuous link with Congress's ability to tax & spend for the general welfare of the population. Phrased alternatively, the Supreme Court upheld the mandate as a tax--NOT a penalty.

Pages 16-30 covers Robert's decision fo the individual mandate - and it's a good one.

Upholding the mandate as a tax under congress's ability to tax, and not upholding it under the commerce clause (and basically saying the government is allowed to force citizens to buy things), is the entire crux of this issue for me.

Roberts should be praised for his prudence and pragmatism, because he was able to uphold the law to please the center left, while alleviating the fears of thinking conservatives like myself.

I agree with you that Roberts should be praised for his prudence and pragmatism; he held true to his belief that the Justices are umpires. However, there's a huge inconsistency in this ruling: The Anti-Injunction Act says that you can't file a lawsuit challenging a tax until after that tax is paid. Congress argued that they intend to enforce the mandate by attaching a "penalty," rather than a "tax," and as such, the Anti-Injunction Act doesn't apply. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court upheld the health care act as a tax for purposes of its constitutionality, but not for purposes of the Anti-Injunction Act. Were this construed as a tax for purposes of the Anti-Injunction Act, then the Supreme Court wouldn't have been able to rule on the issue of the mandate's constitutionality.

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