by nobody
Thursday, Sep. 26, 2013 at 11:27 AM
The far-right are targeting college students and young people with ads telling them not to buy insurance, just pay the fine.
The goal of these anti-ACA ads is to deprive the system of money. Fat chance - most college students get health insurance from school, and a lot of young people get it from their parents.
There's been some stupid ideas out there coming from the anti-Obamacare side, but this one really takes the prize.
Look, there are only three possible options for healthcare for people who aren't wealthy: no insurance, Medicaid, and private insurance.
If you're poor, you get Medicaid. Problem solved.
If you're not poor, you should buy private insurance. There might be some kinds of public or quasi-public options eventually, like going with whatever County is offering, but by and large, it's private.
If you're not poor and don't get insurance, you're going to be seeing some crazy bills. Price inflation hasn't yet been addressed, and the current trend is to push the high prices onto the uninsured.
Don't listen to the wealthy liars. Most wealthy and upper middle class people LOVE insurance. If a rich person or wannabe rich person ever tells you not to buy insurance, they're lying. Listen to what they say to each other: buy long term care insurance, buy insurance on investments (indeed- buy investments that can be insured, like real estate or diamonds, because that mitigates risk), and buy insurance on your house. They also have a list of different life insurances that you can somehow turn into investments. Seriously. I don't understand those products, but they do exist. I just don't feel comfortable putting 100k into these odd things I don't understand.
They are all into buying insurance that, honestly, it seems like it would be hard to collect on. Long term care insurance? That seems like a huge money-losing business. Can they actually predict who will need long term care, and how much?
But I digress. The big fact is, if someone has the money, they will buy insurance. Insurance is kind of like the ultra-capitalist's version of socialism -- it's a kind of mutually funded safety net that's not only private, but entirely monetary. If your house burns down, you don't get a new house - you get money. If your car is crashed, you don't get a car, you get money. (Real socialism is a safety net that's public and focused on services and resources, not money.)
Now the same people are telling young people not to buy insurance.
What a farce.