Californians pay about $500 apiece in extra health insurance premiums to cover the uninsured who get more expensive care through hospital emergency rooms.  Each family is pays approximately $1,400 per year extra. Medical providers shift a substantial portion of those uncompensated costs to health insurers in the form of higher reimbursement demands for  for treating insured patients. Insurers then pass those costs on  in the form of higher premium charges – a hidden tax. Eliminating this hidden tax on the insured will increase the ability of families, individuals, and businesses to spend and invest in other goods and services and stimulate the economy. Eliminating this hidden tax is also simply a matter of fairness according to a report at the San Diego Union Tribune.