Why did the Obama administration earlier this month delay enforcement of the Affordable Care Act's employer mandate until 2015? The administration claims that it needed more time to get the mandate right. Some have suggested that politics—the concern that negative effects of the mandate might kick in before midterm elections in 2014—may have influenced the decision.

My own hope is that the administration acted because it is beginning to understand that portions of the ACA are unworkable despite its drafters' good intentions....