Effects of ACA individual mandate vs AHCA surcharge
Working off of Josh's answer let's do a case study based on a real world example. On Friday, before leaving for a 7 day cruise through the eastern Caribbean, I went to the Dr and got a prescription for Tramadol, a pain reliever to treat an injury. I went to all of the usual suspects, Walgreens, CVS, etc, and found that with my insurance, the cost for 15 50mg pills was 60 dollars. Using the app GoodRX, I was able to reduce this cost to 44 dollars. I decided to pass. Fast forward two days to find me sunning in the Dominican Republic but unable to enjoy myself because of the injury so I found the nearest pharmacy and was able to purchase a blister-pack of 20 50mg pills for 13 US  dollars without a prescription (Tramadol is not regulated like a narcotic as it is in America). These were not knock-offs but the actual meds. How could this be, I wondered. So I asked the pharmacist. He told me that drug manufacturers make all of their profits in America, marking up the same drugs that sell in other countries for reasonable prices to exorbitant prices and then offer modest discounts to insurers, not to mention the profits of the pharmacy. Why can one script be 90 bucks at Walgreens and only 4 bucks at Walmart?  The simple answer is greed and slothfulness. Drug companies and pharmacies rely upon the laziness of Americans and our willingness to get screwed and our eagerness to bitch about problems without the slightest intent on fixing them. 

The moral of this story is that when it comes to managing health care costs, one of the major issues is the regulation of pricing. While I am an ardent believer in capitalism, we must limit the margins charged by drug manufacturers and suppliers alike. The government must modify Medicare Part D to include price controls and introduce these same controls into the ACA or we are doomed to ruination.