Is Paying the Obamacare Tax a Better Choice for the Young and Healthy?

Urgent Update and Correction:

Just as with this article at Business Insider, I missed the fact that enrollment in the exchanges is limited to open enrollment periods.

This does change the risk dynamics of paying the tax rather than buying the insurance.  Any confusion caused by this oversight is regretted.  Even still, those with either few assets to lose or those with sufficient assets to carry them to the next enrollment period, may still want to take the risks as presented in the original post.  The availability of sensible catastrophic true high deductible “real” insurance that Obamacare prohibits and has not been offered in the states would be the answer to this dilemma.

Original Post (with slight unrelated edits):

The following discussion is in no way intended as specific advice as everyone’s situation is different and unique to them, but only as a guide to uninsured young and healthy individuals to understand their choice in whether to buy health insurance on an Obamacare exchange to avoid paying the tax or paying the tax to relieve them of the obligation to purchase the insurance.  The only mandate for the uninsured is to make this choice, not to do one or the other.

The other purpose here is to counter biased government efforts that will insist the only choice is which insurance exchange plan to buy and how to sign up for it, ignoring the possible benefit of paying the tax instead.  This government effort is substantial, as here in Pennsylvania alone, over $6 million of taxpayer money is being directed to one critical thing Obamacare success is dependent on, enrolling as many young and healthy people as possible.  According to Enroll America-Pennsylvania, on July 10, 2013 “health centers in Pennsylvania were awarded a total of $4,196,333 to provide outreach and enrollment assistance.”  They also indicate that an additional $2,071,458 is coming soon to organizations that will act as “Navigators” who will likely never discuss the non-insurance option that is also important for the young and healthy to understand in making their choice.

Young people need to know a few facts of Obamacare at the outset.  Because the law limits charging the old and less healthy more than three times what the young and healthy pay, this shifts more burden to the young.  Offsetting this are premium subsidies to make the insurance choices seem affordable, but as the young advance their careers and their earnings these subsidies fade.  Another important consideration is that shortsighted bureaucrats designed Obamacare to allow no exclusion for previously existing conditions, giving the opportunity to purchase insurance after the onset of a serious illness, even from a hospital bed. Update: Still true, but only if during a subsequent open enrollment period.

The pay-the-tax choice may be useful for young and healthy people who have the discipline to put aside the difference (compared to paying exchange premiums) for their basic normal medical needs, and especially if they then find one of a growing number of physicians offering much lower prices by casting off third party payment for a cash practice.  It must be understood that this choice is not without the risk of an occurrence of a sudden and severe medical condition causing total incapacitation.  This extremely rare event could prevent them from signing up for insurance on an exchange until they are sufficiently recovered to do so.  Update: So long as it is within or until the next open enrollment period.

Putting the sudden-and-severe risk in perspective though is important.  Everyday young healthy people take on huge amounts of student loan debt, with no guarantee of acquiring a job sufficient to easily pay it back, even as student loan debt obligations saddle the borrower for life because  they are not dischargeable in bankruptcy.  Medical debts, on the other hand, can be eliminated through bankruptcy should the highly unlikely occur.  This is where an option to pay the tax and buy a very low cost non-Obamacare compliant policy that pays nothing up to perhaps a $10,000 or even $15,000 deductible, then covers everything above that, would be so useful, but no such thing exists.  Such a plan would be good enough to prevent bankruptcy in most cases and leave substantially less obligation than many young people have willingly taken on with student loans.

It is thus important for young healthy people to see the big picture, understand all their options, then act in their best interest, in reaction to the rules presented to them by the Affordable Care Act.  This discussion has been meant as a guide in starting the navigation of that process.  Additionally, there is a wonderful new resource blog, The Self -Pay Patient, that unfolds a myriad of already available but little known alternatives to insurance, and I highly suggest a visit for anyone serious about learning the many other options available to them, since no government navigator will ever mention any of it.

Note: This post was shared to WatchdogWire