Monday, December 28, 2009
The perversion of the interstate commerce clause
Interesting video on the interstate commerce clause and the decision by the Supreme Court to weaken it; this affects more than just wine sales to other states, it also negatively impacts the sale of health insurance policies across state borders. Since some states have imposed community rating and community issue mandates on the health insurance sold in their states, this has exacerbated the fiefdom and oligarchy of insurance companies that never have to worry about competition from other companies in other states.
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2 comments:
I am not surprised that the Supreme Court would uphold the rights of individual states to impose restrictions on free trade. There are many precedents to this; such as fireworks, or guns, or gambling, or even taxes on internet sales. I do not see, however, how the states could impose restrictions on competition among health insurance companies if such competition is permitted under federal law.
The McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945 bars individuals from purchasing health insurance across state lines. Subsequently, we have health insurance companies protected against anti trust laws due to the natural oligopoly that usual develops in such an environment. What we have now is a neat cartel in each state approved by the U.S. Congress.
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