Why the
individual mandate is needed.
“I would prefer to purchase a new car rather than pay a monthly health-care premium,” Ceci said in a court affidavit after suing to block President Barack Obama’s health-care law, which requires most people to have insurance by 2014. “I cannot afford both.”
The recession hit Ceci hard enough that, 13 months before his March 2010 lawsuit to overturn the insurance requirement, he filed for bankruptcy relief from almost $120,000 of unpaid balances on 20 credit cards, according to court records.
Mary Brown, one of the original participants in the lawsuit at the court, shut down her Florida auto repair shop and filed for bankruptcy in September, listing about $4,700 of unpaid medical bills among $60,000 of unsecured debts.
In a third case pending at the Supreme Court, Charles Edward Lee and Susan Seven-Sky filed suit in Washington saying they refuse to buy insurance because it violates their beliefs that God will provide for their “physical, spiritual and financial well-being.”
Lee, former owner of Eddie Lee Lawn & Tree Service in San Antonio, filed for bankruptcy in September 2009 with $69,000 of credit-card and credit-line debt, $50 in cash and $61 in checking and savings accounts, according to court records.
Seven-Sky, a suburban New York chiropractor and massage therapist, sought bankruptcy protection in September 2006, according to court records, listing almost $58,000 of credit- card debt and $550 of cash and non-retirement savings.
