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The Spectacle Blog
The Obama administration continues to expand access to health insurance. In response to its mandate that everyone in America pay to ensure that impecunious Georgetown law students can have sex for free, a Catholic university in Ohio has dropped student health insurance. Reports the Washington Times:
“The fact that there will be no room one year from now for students to offer health coverage that does not provide contraceptives,” said David Schmiesing, Franciscan University’s vice president for student life. “There’s no room for that one year from now with the current situation. It’s hard for me to see how that’s a compromise.”
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on Tuesday said the rules are not nearly broad enough to ease their concerns that religious groups will be forced to pay for contraception their faith forbids - although indirectly.
“The central problem remains that conscientiously-objecting non-exempt religious organizations will still be required to provide plans that serve as a conduit for contraceptives and sterilization procedures to their own employees,” they wrote. “And their premiums will help pay for those items.”
Oops!
In fact, the Catholic bishops are threatening to sue over the regulation, as they should. Mandating health insurance benefits is bad policy, since it raises costs and forces all of us to pay for benefits we don’t want. Mandating benefits which violate fundamental moral beliefs also is a violation of religious liberty. This is a freedom which people who call themselves “liberal” especially should defend.
View all comments (5) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Doug Bandow
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/05/17/expanding-access-to-health-ins
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Ken (Old Texican)| 5.17.12 @ 8:17AM
Ross, this whole issue has been hinged upon a fraud by the Democrats.
To my certain knowledge, a great many Catholics quietly go about using contraceptives. That is not the issue.
The issue is really about post conception practices,
ie: abortion etc.)
The other issue is trying to enforce financing practices that are anathema to serious Christians of all denominations.
fiscal| 5.17.12 @ 9:08AM
Are you kidding? Health insurance is the most regulated of all insurance products. There are mandates all over the place that force insurance companies to keep you when you get sick, charge you less if you are older, transfer costs from the young to the old, cover you when it would be unprofitable to them, etc. These exist mostly at the state level since health insurance is a state regulated product. You do realize that buying health insurance across state lines is also not the answer because the insurance company must sell you a product approved by your state of residence. Since the rates are regulated, you won't get any deal.
Current health insurance has the most mandated benefits of any product I know of. If you ever had to file a group insurance policy in all 50 states, you'd know that.
In addition, health insurance companies make money by denying claims. This structure does not improve the nation's health. Therefore, health insurance can NEVER be market driven and it can never be a tool to lower our healthcare costs.
I suggest you talk to a group insurance actuary to find out more about this topic.
By the way, most health insurance companies are above board and operate well within the law. However, the structure we have is the most expensive in the world and it is making our country less competitive from a global business perspective.
I prefer a hybrid solution where we have a "medicare" type solution for basic preventative care and emergencies and insurance for the additional coverages each one of us wants. That way, if you want to be kept alive on machines, you can pay an insurance premium for it. If you want to have more than a certain number of office visits, you can pay for it. If you want your insurance to cover your tummy tuck, you can pay for it. If we had this type of system, each of the students in your Catholic university could decide for themselves about their needs and make their own individual decisions.
PaydayLoans@ | 8.26.12 @ 6:07AM
Missing from this argument is the fact that some people don't possess the ability or motivation to be a parent since doing so is a full-time job in itself. Contraception costs society a lot less than does unwanted children who grow into angry adults. Another fact worth mentioning is that all human beings are sexual creatures needing contact with other humans to consider themselves whole. Since sex is considered a valuable part of life, society should encourage everyone to act reasonably responsible and utilize contraception until both participants agree to bring a child into this cruel crazy world.