ObamaCare Could Punish You For Being Healthy: Will smokers and marathon runners pay the same?

Forbes reports:

In the 1970s HMOs started the rather innovative concept of pricing health insurance on the basis of an individual's health. This "risk-based pricing" means that if you treat your body like a temple you pay less for health care than your counterpart who overeats and smokes a pack a day. Even as HMOs came to be reviled, this practice continues in 45 states.

But if a bill like the draft released this week by Sen. Ted Kennedy's Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee gets enacted, health insurance pricing will enter a time warp. Central to that bill--and others backed by the White House--is the concept of "guaranteed issue," where everyone gets the same insurance quote, regardless of their medical history.

Great moments in socialism.