Conservative roots of the individual mandate

The concept of an individual mandate was first proposed by the Heritage Foundation in 1989 in “Assuring Affordable Health Care for All Americans”. It was a market solution to the single-payer proposal. It was championed in the early nineties by Milton Freidman and appeared in the Republican legislative counter point to Bill Clinton’s healthcare plan. It reappeared in the bi-partisan supported “Wyden-Bennet” bill in the late 2000s. It was implemented in Romney’s Massachusetts health care reform in 2006¹.

1. Klein, E. Why We’re Polarized. (Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster, New York, 2020).