I would have thought an increase in FICA by 2-3%, plus raising the FICA ceiling, would have gone a long way towards covering whatever the bill would be. As it

I would have thought an increase in FICA by 2-3%, plus raising the FICA ceiling, would have gone a long way towards covering whatever the bill would be. As it is, for my family, we're paying an extra $5k/year for essentially the same high deductible plan we had 3 years ago. Paying that by being forced in to private insurance feels wrong - paying it via FICA (or some other more general tax) feels easier. There's still 10s of millions who have not bought in to private insurance, because the costs are still too high for them (or they opt out for other reasons), so we're still left with millions uninsured but many people paying more. "Health insurance" != "health care service" which has been the biggest problem in the debate for years.