Lad... My apologies for any 'tone' you read into my comments. None was intended, other than surprise and confusion. I was physically in an awkward position when reading and posting and it appears that some of my physical discomfort came across in my posts.

To summarize my question/point:

The government can make any law it wants... and so long as that law doesn't violate the Constitution, it is the law. In general, the ACA doesn't violate the Constitution. It is basically an expansion of Medicare and the ability to tax people to pay for healthcare.

This is not the question.

The question is, you speak of Hobby Lobby violating an employees rights by offering healthcare that doesn't meet the requirements of the ACA.

I don't believe such a right to employee sponsored healthcare exists... with the best evidence being that many companies are exempt from offering healthcare at all. The size or profitability of a company CAN impact the enforcement of a regulation, but it cannot impact the enforcement of someone's Constitutional rights.

If there isn't a right to Company sponsored healthcare, then from a functional standpoint, what is the difference between your employer offering to pick up 50% of your healthcare premiums for your required policy and your employer offering to pay 100% of your premiums for 50% of the coverage for your required policy? Either way, you still have to get the other 50% covered. Would there be a difference if your employer offered to pick up your preventative care (because that is what they felt they could afford) but you were responsible for everything else... and if your employer offered to pick up everything except contraceptive care (for religious OR financial OR practical reasons) and you were responsible for everything else?

I imagine that the very company that writes the 'limited' policy would be MORE than happy to do the following:
The whole policy costs $1000 per month
The limited policy costs $800 per month
They would charge you $225 per month to purchase the "missing" coverage.

You can argue that the employers actions costs the employee $25, but the employee can go directly to the insurer and pay $1000. If they want the corporate subsidy, they have to pay $225 for $1,000 in healthcare. It's STILL a corporate subsidy and a benefit to the employee.

(04-08-2014 09:02 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  ...And if you're a 50+ year old couple with no dependent children, why should you be FORCED to purchase contraceptive coverage that you will pay for for the next 30+ years and never ever use?...

It's pooled risk. Why should someone who does not smoke be forced to pay for coverage of smoking-related illnesses? Etc.

Does every risk have to be pooled? I can buy life insurance at rates based on nonsmoking, I presume that smokers are excluded from those. I can buy safe driver auto insurance, and home insurance based on proximity to fire hydrants.

(04-09-2014 10:30 AM)Caelligh Wrote:  

(04-08-2014 09:02 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  ...And if you're a 50+ year old couple with no dependent children, why should you be FORCED to purchase contraceptive coverage that you will pay for for the next 30+ years and never ever use?...

It's pooled risk. Why should someone who does not smoke be forced to pay for coverage of smoking-related illnesses? Etc.

(04-09-2014 10:51 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  Does every risk have to be pooled? I can buy life insurance at rates based on nonsmoking, I presume that smokers are excluded from those. I can buy safe driver auto insurance, and home insurance based on proximity to fire hydrants.

In addition to agreeing with OO, I would answer this way.

Of course it is pooled risk... but by pooling the risks, you aren't really changing the numbers... you're merely assigning some of the cost of those risks to people who aren't taking those risks. This doesn't encourage 'healthy' living and is one of my biggest complaints with Obamacare. (my other major one being that it does nothing to create greater 'supply' of healthcare while greatly increasing the demand for it, but that is another discussion)

People who put themselves at higher risk should bear a greater, not lesser percentage of the burden of those risky choices. Whether the government directly collects taxes and pays those premiums for them because they don't earn enough to be able to afford it or not, the total amounts paid in are the same... because this is only math... not magic. You are essentially providing a subsidy to people who CAN afford insurance for their poor choices by penalizing people who make better choices.

I understand that there will be certain things that you can't pull out of a policy and I understand that we are potentially creating an issue for insurers and employers to keep track of the various limited policies and supplements... but everything in insurance is based on ICD-9 and soon ICD-10 codes. All the government needs to do is create 'categories' of these codes and say that everyone MUST have coverage for these 6 (pulling a number from thin air) categories of codes representing the country's priorities. Companies can then go in and offer their employees coverage for anywhere between 0 and 6 of them based on their own values that they, as a company want to support, with people able to buy supplements for the missing categories and even beyond if they so choose. The total amount of healthcare funded is exactly the same.

In Hambone's perfect little world but being overly broad... Immunization and wellness would be one category. Catastrophic care would be another. Emergency life saving care would be another. Mental health would be another. Reproductive care would be another. 'Symptoms' of life choices like certain breathing issues caused by smoking or liver issues caused by drinking or tissue or bone issues caused by poor diet and sedentary lifestyle would generally not be REQUIRED to be covered or would at least carry a much much higher copay because these are often choices. Doctors can certainly determine that things are genetic and not choices and those would be covered... as would cases where people could no longer do anything to stop the disease's progression under catastrophic care... and even support for smoking or drinking cessation or diet and exercise... The government could require all of this to be covered... and a company could choose to fund any or all of these categories. People would have to go to the marketplace for the 'missing' areas. Among the most expensive parts would be that 'choice' category... particularly if it was only borne by those who made those poor choices.... which would often spur people to make better choices.

I'm being overly simplistic I know, but with 150,000 codes in ICD-10, there isn't room to discuss all of the possible combinations of possibilities. Insurers and the CDC can probably most easily break down those codes into groups.