The Obamacare Battle for the Young Invincibles

Steven Binko is young. He’s healthy. So he doesn’t see any reason he should be required to have health insurance. “I’m not in a position to afford any insurance at all,” says the 25-year-old Los Angeles resident who is unemployed. He has coverage through his stepmother’s plan, but he’ll be forced off it when he turns 26 in February. After that, he’ll just do without. “For young people just learning to take care of themselves, it’s foolish we have to take care of our older generation,” he says.

Young invincibles, which is what the insurance industry calls people like Binko, are at the center of a pitched battle between backers of the Affordable Care Act and its opponents. There are an estimated 15.7 million Americans age 19 to 29 who lack insurance, according to the Commonwealth Fund, a New York-based foundation that works to expand access to health care. The White House has said it needs 2.7 million young adults to buy insurance through the government-run marketplaces that open on Oct. 1. Without this group, premiums for seniors with costlier health problems will rise, and the health-care reform may falter.