SHOUTAmerica invited to the White House

Last week, SHOUTAmerica was invited to a discussion on healthcare reform at the White House. The discussion included a group of young leaders from across the nation. The event was hosted by members of President Obama's Healthcare Reform Team and his Office of Public Engagement. As a bipartisan organization that represents young adults, SHOUTAmerica is very pleased to have been invited to the event. We think it is important for young adults to have a strong voice in this debate no matter where you stand politically on the issue as we are the largest uninsured group by age in the country, we will be the ones left paying for healthcare with or without reform, and it is our health future at stake.

In recent weeks, there has been increased media attention about the lack of youth support in the healthcare reform debate. As we can all recall, the reason why President Obama is in office today is in large part due to the support he received from young adults in the election. The President was very successful in mobilizing young adults on the message of change. Since in office, however, the army of young adults that was assembled during the campaign has been fairly quiet on the issue of healthcare reform.

The meeting at the White House last week was put together in part to let the youth know that The White House and the President want the youth's support. During the meeting, several officials from the Office of Public Engagement and the Office of Healthcare Reform spoke about the need to enact comprehensive healthcare reform legislation this year that insures all Americans (see document below). They also spoke about their support of extending the dependent status to age 26. For many months now, SHOUTAmerica has proposed this idea, so we were excited to hear in person the administrations’ support for this issue. After the White House officials spoke, participants in the event had plenty of time to ask questions.

One of the questions that SHOUTAmerica asked about was age rating. In recent weeks, SHOUTAmerica started examining the issue of age rating from a policy perspective. Today, young adults in almost all states can get age-related discounts on their health insurance premiums. These discounts reflect young adults’ lower chance of needing costly medical care. Under current healthcare reform legislation, H.R. 3200 proposes to restrict age-related discounts for young adults.

Restricting age-related discounts in many cases would make health insurance too expensive for young people, who already represent the nation’s largest uninsured group. As shown in the following hypothetical example, shifting to a 2:1 ratio could lead to substantial premium increases for younger adults compared with the 5:1 ratio used in most states today.

This change would have severe unintended consequences such as driving younger people to go uninsured and creating “sticker shock” for those considering buying coverage. Premium increases would also hurt young people just starting out in their careers, who typically have less income than older adults and therefore have greater difficulty affording coverage.

So what did the administration have to say about this issue? They agreed that if H.R. 3200 passed that it could be a problem for young adults.

SHOUTAmerica also urged the Administration to be fiscally responsible on the issue of healthcare reform. As President Obama has mentioned several times, healthcare reform must not increase the federal deficit over the long-term. SHOUTAmerica agrees with the President on this issue, and believes strongly that we need sustainable healthcare reform that bends the cost curve. We tried to reinforce this message last week. Now, we need the President to stick his guns on this, because we all know that we can’t afford the system we have today much less a more expensive one. (see our video)

In closing, each and every young person must get involved in this debate whether you agree with the Administration’s stance or not. Healthcare reform is a vitally important issue, probably one the biggest issues our generation will face. It is the issue that can bankrupt our generation. It is the issue that can harm our health and the health of our children. It is the issue that than can affect the competitiveness of American companies. There are many organizations hoping that we sit on the sidelines, so they can more easily influence the healthcare reform debate at the risk of our future. We can’t afford to let this happen.

Below is a document that Administration Officials passed out at the event to help engage young adults on the issue. Whether you agree with President Obama on the way to move forward on healthcare reform or not, the document provides valuable insight on what the Administration is saying.

Health Insurance Action Reform Guide