As discussed within the Wilensky and Teitelbaum text, the Individual Mandate was an essential building block of the ACA since it was intended that the penalty for not having individual health insurance coverage would be an incentive for people to purchase it through the health exchanges. In addition, the mandate was designed to be a “carrot” for insurers to encourage their participation in the health exchanges.
We also know that there have been legal challenges to this provision of the ACA as well as congressional amendments that essentially eliminated the “tax” levied on those who do not have insurance coverage.
For this discussion, you will consider the following:

Were there alternatives that could have been put into place during the ACA policy formation process that may have accomplished the same goals for insurance enrollment without creating so much political turmoil?
Would an incentive system have been more effective? What would this look like? What incentives would you recommend to encourage enrollment?
What are the pros and cons of using a mandate?
What are the pros and cons of using incentives?
What judicial actions can shed some light on the importance of these considerations?