> If it was just that (in the US), then there would be non need to prevent insurers from pricing based on health of the insured. Or legislating a 3x cap on premiums between highest and lowest premium. Or legislating out of pocket maximums.
I do not follow the point you are making here. The regulation and legislation around health insurance do not change the nature of it.
I think you are assuming that insurers have perfect risk assessments power and thus regulating them should be unnecessary. But they don't and we have to.
> The premiums are very explicitly a subsidy from young to old
You are just repeating your assertions here. I would love some arguments.
> which I view as a tax by a different name. Except instead of it being based on one’s income/wealth, it is based on age.
Sure, as long as we agree that is just your point view and nothing rooted in reality.
Sorry, I don’t really know how else I can explain it. The age rating factor itself is pretty self explanatory.
Instead of charging a sicker or older person $10,000 per month and healthier or younger people $100 per month because that is close to the expected loss in the calendar year for the insurer, they are mandated to charge younger/healthier people $1,000 per month so the older person can only be charged $3,000 per month.
Imagine a similar law for motor vehicles. The car insurance companies can only charge the worst and riskiest drivers 3x what the safest driver pays. Basically, you can keep getting into collisions and at some point your premium will stop increasing. Where will the money to pay for all the damages come?
> I think you are assuming that insurers have perfect risk assessments power and thus regulating them should be unnecessary.
I do not assume this. Insurance and tax/wealth redistribution is a spectrum.
Yes, if you strictly view it from a short time horizon. If you think of it as an individual's risk over their whole lifetime, then it looks a lot better. A young person is "paying it forward" now, in exchange for having their own expensive treatments covered once they are old. This is the bargain that any social security or old-age pension system strikes.
The trouble is, as social cohesion breaks down, and demographic cliffs approach, people lose faith that long-term programs will still be there for them as they age. Perceptual time horizons shrink, and the arguments that you have made begin to resonate.
I don't have a good answer for either of those problems. Immigration solves the demographic cliff, but appears to threaten social cohesion. We can get into tedious and repetitious arguments about why that is, but let's please not?
Here what i am understanding of the point you are making :
When we offer a service to a group of person, and somehow mandate a flat price for that service. The people using the service less are subsidizing the cost for the people who use the service less.?
> The people using the service less are subsidizing the cost for the people who use the service more.?
Also, it is not a flat price, it is a capped price.
As an aside, think about how the optics would have been if the politicians were transparent that a significant portion of the tax liability to pay for the healthcare would be levied based on age.
Then think about older, rich people taking advantage of this and retiring early (between age 50 to 65), and because they can afford to have very low income (but a lot of assets), they qualify for even more subsidies during their most expensive years to insure, without negatively affecting their lifestyle.
I do not follow the point you are making here. The regulation and legislation around health insurance do not change the nature of it.
I think you are assuming that insurers have perfect risk assessments power and thus regulating them should be unnecessary. But they don't and we have to.
> The premiums are very explicitly a subsidy from young to old
You are just repeating your assertions here. I would love some arguments.
> which I view as a tax by a different name. Except instead of it being based on one’s income/wealth, it is based on age.
Sure, as long as we agree that is just your point view and nothing rooted in reality.