ObamaCare: Life Lessons for America’s Youth – Thinking Outside The Box

I don’t understand all this complaining about ObamaCare by America’s conservatives. The fact of the matter is that ObamaCare, and what we have seen so far about its enrollment Web site, should be praised by conservatives.

Since I first joined the ranks of conservatives I have constantly heard complaints that America’s youth lack perseverance, and that they are unfocussed, impatient, self-centered, disrespectful of their elders, spoiled, and unwilling to sacrifice for the good of their country.

ObamaCare and its enrollment Web site, HealthCare.gov, seem to be tailor-made to cure our youth of these shortcomings.

For example, take the lack of perseverance exhibited by our youth. They constantly seek immediate satisfaction of their every desire. The TV generation of the ‘60s has gone on steroids with the Internet, iPhones, Instant Messenger and Twitter.

When our youth want something, they want it NOW!

It is about time that our federal government has done something to address this societal problem. The ObamaCare enrollment site has not just slowed down our light-speed youth, it has slammed the breaks on them.

Now I must admit that – at a cost somewhere north of a half-billion dollars – the Web site Healthcare.gov has been a bit expensive, but you can’t expect a Web site that crashes consistently, day and night, no matter how few or how many users try to logon to be designed or developed on the cheap. It takes a team of highly skilled software engineers to do that!

At last our youth have a government program to help them develop patience. Watching a rotating hour glass symbol for many hours will do them good.

If, after waiting for those hours, the Gen-Xers are disconnected, they will just have to man up, quit complaining and try again. And if that fails, they must learn to pick themselves up, brush themselves off, and try yet again!

Perseverance is a virtue. Did our forefathers quit just because they had to walk uphill to and from kindergarten in four feet of snow? Hell no! Why should a few hours trying to connect to an Internet Web site represent such a devastating experience?

Once they finally get connected, our youth seeking to purchase a health insurance policy will naturally be anxious to browse the plans that are available and compare costs.

OK kids, not so fast! HealthCare.gov wasn’t designed to maximize customer satisfaction. That would have merely re-enforced the pampering that spoiled our youth in the first place.

Instead of allowing the browsing of insurance plans based on some simple inputs like zip code, age and sex, our youngsters will be faced with endless requests for authentication data along with numerous personal questions regarding race, ethnicity, employment status, income, assets, and marital status to determine eligibility for special treatment/subsidies.

Wouldn’t you think that authentication could be accomplished at the time of purchase AFTER our youth decide that they actually want to buy something? That is what users experience on Amazon or Hotels.com … BUT not on HealthCare.gov.

No, on the ObamaCare Web site the products being sold are carefully hidden along with the prices. It is like the computer games where players have to search hundreds of rooms and fight a gaggle of dragons and sorcerers before they find the treasure. This aspect of the Web site should be considered a feature, not a flaw. When you have a bad product, it is better to hold off showing it until the buyer is worn down and is willing to do anything to end the nightmare.

The experience of actually getting through this maze on HealthCare.gov can’t be adequately described because very few have actually succeeded. It appears that those who have successfully run the gauntlet are keeping the secret of their passage under wraps. Most likely they are holding out for a book contract (The Dummies Guide to The World’s Most Embarrassing Web Site).

What we do know is that when young users finally do get to see the policies offered and their prices, they be faced with their next big lesson, courtesy of ObamaCare.

What they will discover is that they have to choose between paying for an overpriced health policy crammed full of expensive coverage they don’t need, want or will ever use OR they will have to go without health insurance and pay a hefty fine … sorry, I mean a tax.

If they were previously insured, they will discover that their options under ObamaCare are 50-250% more expensive than their old policies while having substantially higher deductibles.

But ignore these shortcomings for the moment. The beauty of the ObamaCare scheme is that the excess revenue collected from these young people is slated to pay the healthcare costs of much wealthier retirees.

Our youth could throw their hands up and complain that they are really being screwed six ways from Sunday. And they would be correct. The Democrat Party has treated them worse than crash test dummies.

Soon after graduating, our young men and women will discover that there are very few jobs for them because the Democrats have created a massive regulatory jungle and insisted on high tax rates, both of which have driven employers to stop creating jobs. The situation is made worse by the inadequate education our recent graduates have enjoyed thanks to self-serving public teacher unions.

And with ObamaCare, the job market they face has gone from bad to worse. In the unlikely case that young job seekers do find a job, it is likely to be part time with no healthcare benefits. Why? Because ObamaCare’s health insurance mandate discourages the creation of full-time positions with benefits.

After getting their first paycheck from a low paying, part-time job, these youngsters will learn that they are being forced to pay 15% of their income into Social Security – a program that is expected to face bankruptcy before they retire. It is likely they will pay the SS tax for decades and get very little if anything in return.

Finally, they will find out about the 17 trillion dollar federal debt that will be passed on to them and their children along with $500 billion in annual interest payments. So what should our youth do? They should absorb some additional life lessons.

If they choose, they could learn to suppress their selfish instincts and commit an act of self-sacrifice. They could thank Obama for the opportunity to reduce their financial wellbeing by signing up for an overpriced plan and thereby transferring a substantial portion of their income to wealthy retirees.

OR, they could make a more sensible decision. They could refuse to sacrifice themselves and their families to Obama’s failing and immoral progressive agenda. They could boycott this irrational monstrosity and make the truly moral decision to retain their assets for themselves and their families.

And finally, they could join the only political movement that is fighting for their rights and well-being: The Tea Party.

Dr. Charles Ormsby Dr. Charles Ormsby served two terms on the North Andover School Committee, co-founded of the North Andover Taxpayers Association, is a a co-founder of and columnist for The Valley Patriot, broadcasts weekly opinion pieces for WCAP (980 AM) in Lowell, and is a faculty member in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Dr. Ormsby is a graduate of Cornell and has a doctorate degree from MIT. You can email him at ccormsby@verizon.net More Posts