Pennsylvania health insurance House bill targets health coverage

The Republican-sponsored bill passed the House Health Committee on a party line vote, 14-9.
Democrats criticized the bill as a violation of the U.S. Constitution that will do nothing to help more people afford health insurance, but committee Chairman Matt Baker, R-Tioga, said the bill, if it becomes law, will give Pennsylvania more legal avenues to challenge the federal law in court.
"It gets singularly to the mandate issue of forcing people to buy insurance that they may not want, they may not need and they don't even have a choice," Baker told reporters after the vote.
The legal impact of any state measure is questionable, since courts generally have held that federal laws trump those in states. And while Baker said the state arguably could enforce such a law, he also acknowledged that the matter is likely to be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court before the insurance requirement in the federal law takes effect in three years.
The federal law was passed by a Democratic-controlled Congress and was signed by President Barack Obama last March. Spokesmen for Republican majority leaders in the state House and Senate said Monday they could not predict whether or when the bill will reach a floor vote, although Baker said House Majority Leader Mike Turzai, R-Allegheny, had encouraged him to move it out of his committee. A separate bill in the Senate also would seek to block the requirement through a constitutional amendment, although it remains in committee.
Pennsylvania already is party to a states' lawsuit that challenges the federal insurance requirement.
The law's core requirement is that Americans carry health insurance except in cases of financial hardship. Starting in 2014, those who cannot show they are covered by an employer, government program or their own policy would face fines by the Internal Revenue Service.