State Insurance Commish Says Obamacare Individual Mandate Unenforceable

[Conan71]

Commissioner Kim Holland is saying the penalty for not buying individual health insurance is not enforceable as the IRS cannot tack on penalties or file liens:

The requirement that individuals buy health insurance under the national health reform law is not only its most controversial provision, it is one that doesn't have teeth, state Insurance Commissioner Kim Holland said Thursday.

"As it stands today, I don't think this mandate is enforceable," she said.

Holland spoke during a forum Thursday at the University of Oklahoma-Tulsa in which she outlined health-care reform changes as well as how they affect Medicare.

The individual mandate, which takes effect in 2014, requires people who don't buy health insurance the first year to pay a penalty of $95 or 1 percent of their income.

And that's just not enough, Holland said.

For instance, she said, if a 26-year-old man is asked to choose between purchasing health insurance for about $2,000 per year or paying the $95 penalty, what do you expect him to choose?

"The penalty will be collected by the IRS, but it took away the IRS' tools to enforce the law. They cannot fine you an additional amount. They can't charge interest, and they can't file a lien on your home," Holland said.

"This is very challenging and hardly enforceable."

Although she said enforcement isn't strong enough, Holland defended the need for the individual mandate.

If it weren't part of health reform, states wouldn't be able to spread the risk among a broad pool of the population, she said.

"If we don't require everybody to buy coverage, who's going to sign up? Old sick people," Holland said.

"Insurers need young, healthy people paying in to offset the medical payouts for the sick people.

Read more from this Tulsa World article at http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=17&articleid=20100820_17_A11_ULNStt953877&archive=yes

[izmophonik]

There has been a lot of arguing about the mandate (which I support).  But beyond the issue if someone agrees/disagrees with the concept, the reality is that the mandate doesn't really affect that many people.  We're only talking about folks who aren't already enrolled in an insurance plan via their employer. 

So we're talking about individuals who are self employed and small businesses that ALREADY can buy insurance for their employees at a cheaper rate than before the bill was passed AND they get a tax break on top of that.

Lastly, the government doesn't mandate the fine because it allows the states to come up with alternate plans if they don't want to follow the federal plan.  But the state must come up with a plan.  Therefore if the states don't like the plan they can make their own...which by the way none of them have.  Hence...penalty for not joining.