Subsidies through Healthcare.gov may be illegal.

[Person Man]

I won't comment on the decision because I don't know enough about the law to comment intelligently.

That being said, the consequences of this being upheld by the supreme court would be devastating. This would in effect lead to many more healthy people not joining plans, leading to a sicker pool of patients signing up for ACA plans, leading to higher and higher premiums. While some conservatives who live in their mom's basements and don't interact with the real world will be ecstatic, this decision would unnecessarily hurt a lot of people.

There are a lot of problems with the ACA, and I have outlined some myself and been accused of posting clickbait, but the subsidies are not it. Whoever came up with this challenge is an ideologue whose only concern is defeating Obama, not upholding the constitution or creating better public policy. The ACA is the law of the land and businesses have adjusted to it. There are many ways of making the law better but destroying it creates more uncertainty and hurts the economy.

This. That's why I'm very concerned if the 2014 election shows that the country is pushing to the right way too fast. Beyond the fact that I'm not really for that to begin with. If this decision is upheld, which it probably won't though, I would expect that the ACA will be repealed in full by 2017. The republicans will basically get their "start over" that they want and the Democrats will probably filibuster their counter proposal.

[Person Man]

What would the alternative be if we can't actually enforce Obamacare after all? I know we would have to repeal the rest of it. Do we just let the Republicans block lawsuits by idiot doctors and let them let Wyoming or North Dakota do some bizarre insurance and financing scheme that eventually causes a bubble? And do we then say we are for "medicare for all" but won't ever have enough voted until we have a depression or major abrogation of civil rights that makes the HL decision and the housing bubble look pedestrian?

[Person Man]

I don't think SCOTUS will even hear it if the en banc decision reverses this one. Affirming this decision would be like if Roe v. Wade was decided on an issue of wording. Such a decision would be as significant as Roe v. Wade in that many people would see it as the Court prohibiting even a basic function of Government. On the other hand, it could be argued that such as a decision was narrowly tailored but given gerrymandering, the business and political cycle (at this point it would take a miracle for the Democrats to be the majority party again before the Republicans get another turn) it will be about another decade before such a mistake could be corrected and knowing what we know, they may still rule against it.