I don’t think there is any chance that Ginsburg, Breyer, Kagan or Sotomayor are going to vote to overturn Obama’s biggest “accomplishment” in office.
By the way, I read the opinion ... it is well worth reading.
I find interesting the government’s arguement for the individual mandate:
* since we require hospitals to treat patients regardless of ability to pay,
* many of those who do not have health insurance don’t pay
* this results in cost shifting to others who do pay, specifically those with health insurance
* which makes health insurance unaffordable
* so we have the right to require individuals to buy health insurance so they will pay
So, the mandate for hospitals to treat regardless of ability to pay leads to a mandate to buy medical health insurance. This illustrates how one government intervention into the economy necessitates further interventions, and why governments grow.
Note that the (unfunded) mandate for hospitals to treat regardless of ability to pay was the FedGov’s way of funding health care for the indigent without raising taxes explicitly (like medicare and medicaid). TANSFAFL (There Ain’t No Such Thing As a Free Lunch) - someone pays, and it is both cowardly and arrogant of Congress to demand distortion of health care finance just to avoid revealing how much their mandate costs.
Maybe we should take a step back and rethink the unfunded hospital mandates.
They see insurance as a profit making evil, a remnant from the days of “Dead White men” and Slavery.
The objective always was the destruction of Insurance and giving all management of Health care to Communist Czars in DC. All dollars flowing to DC, and then the pennies left over flowing back to Doctors.