Challenging the Obama Health Care Legislation Research Paper

Challenging the Obama Health Care Legislation - Research Paper Example Moreover, the petitioners claim that the new Act infringes the Tenth Amendment, emphasizing that a directive that coerces people to either get a health insurance or be penalized is undemocratic and unlawful (Bandow 2011). The Congress (2010) has once declared: â€Å"By most measures, we have the best medical care system in the world† (p. 32). Yet, there are still major problems and critical issue. A significant portion of the population does not have insurance and costs are continuously increasing. Failure to get a health insurance can prevent one from gaining access to preventative care. The uninsured are given treatment when s/he becomes sick, as recognized by the defendants since health care in the United States is commonly given because of incapacity to afford medical expenses or acquire a health insurance. Yet, the acquired costs to provide medical services to the uninsured are at times remain unpaid. The costs of unpaid health care services are transferred to economic actors in the form of increased premiums and costs, which, consequently, can contribute to the continuity of the cycle and further enlarge the uninsured population (Congress 2010). The Congress approved of the PPACA against these conditions. The petitioners challenge a number of the interconnected parts of the PPACA as well. Primarily, the new Act considerably changes and enlarges the Medicaid plan. Medicaid is a joint federal-state initiative established in 1965 that supports federal subsidy to states that decide to offer health care to vulnerable and poor populations (Congress 2010). PPACA will expand the numbers of new entrants to the Medicaid rosters by widening the initiative to encompass all people under 65 years of age with a specific income percentage of the federal poverty threshold (Health Care Lawsuits 2011). Furthermore, the new Act opens the opportunity for the formation of medical benefit transactions intended to permit start-up or small businesses and individuals to control their purchasing power to acquire viable prices (Bandow 2011).  Ã‚