What’s the purpose of or rationale for an individual mandate?
Congress has described the individual mandate as a form of “shared responsibility.” The current system is fundamentally flawed, as it shifts the costs of providing care among both the insured and the uninsured. The insured “pay for” services provided to the uninsured, but the insured usually pay lower negotiated prices for the same services. By contrast, the uninsured are charged higher prices for the services they receive as they have no power to negotiate a lower fee. More importantly, health care costs can be reduced only if the costs and the risks are spread among the largest possible populations. Thus, the mandate includes younger and healthy individuals who might otherwise choose to be uninsured. Increasing the size of the risk pool can reduce per capita claims costs, administrative costs and premiums. Finally, an individual mandate is intended to keep individuals from “gaming the system” by waiting until they need medical care to purchase coverage for their unexpected health car
