Before the pitchforks come out, keep this in mind: before Obamacare increased access to affordable individual plans, employers were the typical purchasers of health care plans. When you have a 100+ person company, the company pays a rate that averages out their employee pool's healthcare needs. Now we have a situation where more people can more efficiently participate in the healthcare market. Individuals who are young and healthy will opt for a lower cost plan, and those who already have illnesses or higher risk for illness will spend more for their healthcare. This efficiency on the consumer side is destroying revenue for the healthcare companies.
I am not saying that anything was even close to perfect before, but we're seeing the private sector responding to Obamacare - it's not profitable enough or even sustainable in some cases. Now the government wants to block companies from trying to salvage their profits? Yes, consumers are benefitting now, but what happens when there are 2 options left for healthcare in each state?
I think in this case, it's clear that the hybrid Capitalist / Socialist approach is not the way to go. Either the government needs to let health care companies operate the way the market allows them to, or move to a single payer system.
replies(2):