UChicagoLaw Faculty Discuss Health Care Decision
Live tweets from a discussion on June 28, 2012 about the just-handed-down Supreme Court decision on the Affordable Care Act.
Live tweeting of the @uchicagolaw faculty discussing the #ACA decision will begin in just a few minutes. #UChiLawSCt- Prof Julie Roin has stepped to the podium to start off our discussion! #UChiLawSCt
- Hutchinson: deft move by Roberts -Congress can't hold a gun to the heads of the states. Most states are going to take the money. #UChiLawSCt
"Caveat emptor" says @randypicker, but here's his grid trying to figure out the nine votes on 7 issues from #UChiLawSCt http://pic.twitter.com/IrW0JUpe- Picker: most interesting is the interaction between the commerce and tax powers. #UChiLawSCt
LaCroix: you could come out of all of this and say that this isn't a use of the commerce power. #UChiLawSCt- Huq: If a Romney administration wants to privatize Social Security, that would be off the table. Fennell: Why? #UChiLawSCt
- Roin: Agree that it's off the table - it's not a tax. Huq: You could find a way to write it so it's a tax. #UChiLawSCt
- Huq: No Jusitce except for Thomas says anything negative about any past commerce clause decision. LaCroix: same true in Lopez. #UChiLawSCt
- Fennell: open question of whether if a program is too big, too much, then it's not ok. #UChiLawSCt
- LaCroix: This decision brings back into the conversation the idea of coercing the states to take certain action. #UChiLawSCt
- McAdams: Does this decision mean that big changes are different than tiny little changes? Is proportionality implicit? #UChiLawSCt
Grid displayed, time to tweet. On the Medicaid issue, how should Congress change programs and still avoid coercion as to states? #UChiLawSCt- Strahilevitz: nice parallel betw parts of the opinion about whether it's a permissible tax & those dealing with state/federal. #UChiLawSCt
- Huq: In the state, but not the individual, context the dependency is bilateral. Not just the states that are locked in. #UChiLawSCt
- Huq: It's still possible for a state to say we're not going to take Medicaid. #UChiLawSCt
- Stahilevitz: How will the administration respond to the Medicaid strike down? #UChiLawSCt
- Under existing law, the administration doesn't have to think about much other than think about implementation. #UChiLawSCt
- Exchanges are largely going to benefit small group and individual buyers. #UChiLawSCt
- Huge amount of tax breaks go to anyone who purchases in the exchange. #UChiLawSCt
- Picker: This is about our inability to make choices and need for the government to help us. #UChiLawSCt
- Picker: Can the government can pass a law that says "you have to buy lettuce every month and if you don't, pay a tax." #UChiLawSCt
- Everyone else: "Yes." Roin: "It's like charity - give to charity or pay higher taxes." #UChiLawSCt
