An Obamacare Riddle

If everyone must get health insurance, or pay a penalty, and the legal rationale for this mandate is that everyone enters the health care market and either has insurance, or costs others (free rider).

If I am wealthy enough to self insure (I keep money in reserve to pay for all my health care costs), the "free rider" argument cannot be applied to me, because I transfer no burden to others when I use healthcare. I therefore do not affect interstate commerce (as argued by the government) beforehand (I am not purchasing anything), or after the fact (I transfer no burden to others).


I also have not purchased a government approved healthcare policy, an offense, for which others are subject to a penalty.


If the government's argument for their power to regulate non activity as commerce does not apply to me, then I am not subject to the law, because it is (by their own argument) beyond their authority to apply it to me. If I am not subject to the law, and another person is subject to the law, then it is a violation of the "equal protection" clause of the 14th amendment.

The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution contains the clause:

"nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."


If I am, subject to the penalty and the law, regardless of the government's authority to apply it to me, then it violates the "without due process" clause of the same amendment.

Assume that I do not qualify for a waiver.

Question:

Am I subject to the penalty, and therefore the law?