Won't deferring the individual mandate be a fiscal time bomb?

[King]

Republicans know

1. Delaying the mandate would destroy the program and turn it into a disaster
2. The public is too dumb to connect that the mandate delay was the reason the program was a disaster

[King]

Why lease a car for $150/month when you can flush $75/month down the toilet for half the price?

[King]

Wouldn't it be more rational to pay the tax than to buy insurance?

No. Paying the tax is the irrational choice. In exchange for paying the tax, which will eventually rise to 2.5% of your yearly income, you literally get nothing. When you pay for insurance, which will come with a check from the feds to help you afford it, you get something. Something is better than nothing, you see.

A 29-year-old in California with an income of $25,000 has two options:

Pay a $52 monthly tax to get $0 worth of coverage.
Pay $144 monthly for insurance to get $229 worth of coverage.

Wouldn't the rational person just pay the extra $92 a month for health insurance? Even if it's a "bad deal" at the $229 level, it's certainly worth it at $144.

$52 is 2.5%.  You said eventually.  What is it in 2014?  The income tax on $25,000 is $1800 per year.  $2400 is not that much more.

The typical 29-year-old doesn't have $144/monthly medical costs, let alone $229/monthly worth of medical costs, so even at the subsidized price, it does not have the value you attribute to it.  If you live in a 3rd floor walk-up studio apartment, a lawnmower "worth" $229 that you can buy for $144 is not a good deal.

That's not how insurance works.  If you can't see that, you have no business arguing about the ACA.  Insurance requires that the typical customer pay more than their typical expense per month to "insure" against the risk of an unusually bad outcome.  That's why it's insurance.  The value is in being protected from unexpected, large expenses.

aah... finally a distinction. Insurance in a commerce based society is the opposite from a pooling of others liability being redistributed. Socialism has no dynamic growth, it consumes itself - its value. Insurance in it's commerce base, is the multiplication of a value from the results of works - investments, the capitulations of wants that have the profit to which claims are paid.   

I think your database is confusing insurance with a 401k.

[King]

Not going bankrupt due to a major health emergency is instant gratification?

[King]

Not going bankrupt due to a major health emergency is instant gratification?

Typical Californian (29 YO; $25,000 year salary): Yo.
Do-Gooder: Yo, how's the condo?
TC (glares): Like dude, I make $2000 a month.  I'm sleeping on the couch at my friend, and help with the food.

You think the typical Californian lives on his friend's couch?

You think the Typical Californian, 29 and making $25,000/year and single, owns a  condo, and would lose it when he files for bankruptcy?

The Typical Californian, 29, who makes $25k a year is likely non-white and lives in a non-white poverty stricken area or if he is white lives in a studio apt in a re-emerging ghetto somewhere urban. Not on his rich friend's couch.