Dear Owen,
"My suggestion is a federal mandate that all individual policies are, in total, a group. They get group rates and no pre ex exclusions."
The difficulty here is that many folks would sensibly refrain from buying health insurance until some major illness arose.
Without the ability to exclude pre-existing conditions, or to require continuous coverage in lieu of the exclusion, health insurance companies would receive individual policy premiums primarily from sick people, and not from well people.
Insurance doesn't work so well under those circumstances.
Your idea only works if there is an individual mandate requiring every adult to obtain health insurance. This hasn't usually gone over well with some segments of the Republican coalition.
sitetest
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The difficulty here is that many folks would sensibly refrain from buying health insurance until some major illness arose.
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I think I disagree with this, and this is the focus of your objection. Group plans for employers cover everyone. Individual policies would be bought by those who choose to buy them. Yes, maybe this hurts the insurance industry, but that's what the industry targetted tax cut is for.
I am not invested in my own suggestion. My only focus here is to get the GOP recalibrated. Health Insurance used to be something that was not a conservative issue. It has to become a conservative issue NOW or we will lose 2008. I think it may be the #1 issue of 2008.