Will Young People Heed the Imminent Health Insurance Mandate?

Published: Wed 26 May 2010

Tiffany Strong

Young adults received a fairly good deal from the health care reform legislation-a recent Commonwealth Fund report indicates that many of the 13.7 million who currently lack coverage will have health insurance under the new plan when it takes effect. The report indicated that young adults will profit not only from the stipulation that enables them to remain on their parents' health insurance plans until they're 26, but also from components such as the creation of insurance exchanges, wider Medicaid eligibility, and subsidies for premiums.

Of course, with the bill's benefits come obligations: the mandate to buy health insurance beginning in 2014 if your income is high enough. The report says that is "particularly important in terms of creating broad and diverse risk pools in the exchanges and individual markets." Young adults with minimal medical expenses compensate for older people, who typically require more medical services. If, on the other hand, you are healthy and young, purchasing health insurance might not seem like the wisest use of your money.

About the Commonwealth Fund Survey

When Commonwealth completed its yearly survey of young adults in 2009, healthcare reform legislation had not yet passed, so it is impossible to predict how a government health insurance mandate will be received. However, the survey did ask young adults ages 19 to 29 if they supported a proposal to require insurance for all Americans, much like liability insurance for auto drivers, with federal subsidies for individuals who could not afford coverage. The response was quite strong-62 percent said they favored such a requirement. Women, those with annual incomes of $20,000 or less, and Democrats were more likely to favor the idea than men, those with incomes of $60,000 or more per year, and Republicans.

Predictably, "affordability of the premium and ease of enrollment will be key to the compliance of low- and moderate-income young adults," according to the report. Research of other United States mandates has discovered that high compliance rates also depend on penalties that are "stiff, but not excessive, and carry a perception that they will be enforced" and that have a specific sign-up time period.