A well-said defense of Obamacare

[Brittain33]

The worst cross-subsidy is how public universities were nearly free for the boomers but kids these days have to rack up huge debts to pay for the same education because the Boomers won't support the kinds of taxes their parents paid. That's a more pernicious cross-subsidy.

[Brittain33]

Lots of young people have mental health issues, sometimes needing hospitalization. Often they just benefit from having medical supervision and regular prescriptions... and yes the cost of the prescription alone is probably less than the cost of insurance... but there's a mental block associated with spending that higher amount with no medical supervision vs. having a doctor prescribe it and having it be much less expensive as part of overall care.

Dental work is not something that springs up at age 40, either.

[Brittain33]

As I say, young people aren't crazy.  They intelligently choose not to buy health insurance because it is -- as currently inflicted on them by government regulators -- a bad bargain.  Let the insurers design plans specifically geared to young people and they WILL buy them.

Young people don't buy insurance because in most states it's a bad bargain - because insurance companies assume only sick or expensive young people buy it and price it accordingly.

Individual insurance is ridiculously expensive in most states where insurance actually has value because of the adverse selection problem. If insurance were available for $250 a month when I was 22, I'd have bought it. But it was more like $1,000 when it was even available, and with high co-pays. An employer pays a fraction of that for a 22-year old employee because of their bargaining power and because requiring employment has the same effect as a mandate - it brings healthy people into the pool.