Collegiate Times

As soon as you turn 22, whether you?re a full-time student or not, you will most likely be dropped from your parents? healthcare coverage. It?s a startling fact of life that students across the nation have to deal with as they?re preparing to graduate and begin their careers.

However, more and more U.S. companies are no longer offering employee healthcare coverage due to profit losses and spending cutbacks. This illustrates the fact that our culture has evolved from one in which people spent their entire careers with one employer to one in which workers bounce from company to company, rarely choosing to settle down.

So, if 22-year-old students and recent graduates have to have insurance, but their employer refuses to provide it, where will they turn? Private insurance providers are always an option (albeit a costly one), but now, for Massachusetts residents, the state government is a choice as a viable healthcare provider. That?s because on Wednesday, Gov. Mitt Romney signed a bill that is designed to guarantee coverage to all Massachusetts residents by July 2007. The law provides subsidies and sliding-scale premiums to get poor and low-income residents into health plans and requires those deemed able to afford insurance to purchase a policy, according to CNN.

Additionally, an ABC News-Washington Post poll of more than 1,000 adults nationwide released Wednesday found that 55 percent of Americans would support a healthcare law similar to Massachusetts? in their own states. The projected cost of the healthcare program reaches over $1 billion by the third year of the program?s existence, and the state plans to pay for it through federal reimbursements and existing state spending, officials told CNN.

For college students who are already strapped for cash, cheap, government-provided insurance sounds like a dream come true, right?

Well, yes and no. While the premiums 22-year-olds would be forced to pay would undoubtedly be much cheaper, students and recent grads would ultimately be paying for their coverage through a different means?increased taxes. Virginia, especially, could not afford to implement a program following Massachusetts? model without drastically hiking taxes to pay for it.

In addition, government-provided insurance would possess a more impersonal feel, and would ultimately retain less quality than the current system has. Under the current healthcare system, providers compete against one another to provide the most and best coverage to people as possible?and while it?s often more expensive and leaves out those who can?t afford to pay high premiums, the coverage is top-notch.

However, government-subsidized healthcare does have a few major benefits, such as providing nearly every state resident with affordable coverage and further removing the burden from companies who are worried about providing healthcare for their employees. Yet, government-subsidized healthcare seems pretty infeasible for Virginia, at least for the time being, since the state legislature has deemed that it currently has higher priorities, such as higher education and transportation. It also simply can?t afford to pay for it with its current tax base without taking away from other programs.