Some logical problems with Obamacare

OBAMA: Now, I think the really interesting question is why it is that my friends in the other party have made the idea of preventing these people from getting health care their holy grail, their number-one priority.

Naked Capitalism - However, from the public purpose perspective, the really interesting question is why our “friends” in both parties refuse to put truly universal coverage — for example, single payer Medicare for All — on the table at all. Remember, ObamaCare is, pathetically, projected to enroll only 7 million people in its first year, and when fully implemented will leave about as many uninsured as newly insured — 25 or 30 million, but with “these people,” who’s counting?

Be that as it may, we’re stuck with ObamaCare for now. And no matter what Obama says, the real problems with ObamaCare are not “glitches” and can’t be solved with “adjustments” or “administrative changes”‘; they are fundamental to its system architecture, which demands that every American be thrown into one eligibility bucket or another, with the number of possible buckets being 1 (Federal) x 50 (states) x 9 (the number of income levels) = 450. At least I think so* Maybe somebody smarter than me wants to calculate the combinatorial explosion, taking the differences between the actual plans offered in each jurisdiction into account. Anyhow, ObamaCare’s complex, confusing, and Rube Goldberg-esque system of eligibility determination mean that people inevitably get thrown into the wrong buckets, or there aren’t even the right buckets for them. Worse, people are thrown into buckets for whimsical and arbitrary reasons, leading to a fundamental lack of equity, of common fairness, for the entire program.

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