Do you know what the Kaiser Family Foundation is counting. The most interesting thing I heard about the 47m number is it is a real number. But it is the number of Americans who are ever for any reason uninsured in a given year. This include people who choose to be uninsured for on reason or another, like being healthy or between jobs for a short time.

It also, includes people who are eligible for government insurance already but have not applied. These people would automatically be covered if they needed to be.

Brandon, I'm disappointed that you've quoted so liberally from a commentator, who writes for an ideologically partisan organization, without checking out the claims she makes, let alone the studies that she cites.

First, what is this Kaiser Family Foundation statistic that she claims to cite to? Is there a report year or title? A link? A name of a spokesperson? The statistic that I get from the Kaiser Family Foundation says that 46+ million Americans are uninsured. The Uninsured: A Primer, Kaiser Family Foundation, at 4, Oct. 2007, available at http://www.kff.org/uninsured/upload/7451-03.pdf. The report, and information on their website make no such claim that the uninsured American number is between 13.9 and 8.2 million. Note too that the Census report that she cites agrees with the 46+ million figure. See www.census.gov/prod/2006pubs/p60-231.pdf at 20. In fact, it indicates that 8.3 million children are uninsured. Id. at 25.

Second, it is important to note that the commentator's use of yearly income conflates individual yearly income with yearly household income. The Census measures the latter, which is the figure that represents the total income for all working adults in a household to provide for all members, adult and dependent, of the household. With the average national premium cost of private health care for an individual at $4479/year, and of $12,106/year for a family of four, we have to wonder how the commentator is able to reach, without further explanation or analysis, for her conclusion that households making $50,000/year or more are able to afford health coverage for all of their members. See The Uninsured: A Primer, at 16. How does she account for households with many children? For regional cost of living differences? For coverage of people with pre-existing medical conditions? For gross incomes that are at $50,000, but require large educational or housing loan repayments? Can we simply say that even though those people don't have health care, a commentator thinks that they should (irrespective of their individual circumstances), and therefore it is deceptive for someone to make reference to the fact that they do not have health care? That seems absolutely illogical to me.

The commentator also takes the liberty of excluding uninsured residents who are not citizens, but I don't understand why. Why shouldn't permanent legal residents who are not yet citizens be included? They pay taxes and follow the law just like everyone else.