The government forces us to purchase stuff all the time, DougR. The most obvious example is car insurance. You will probably say that we are not being forced to buy that insurance because we don't have to own a car if we don't want to pay for car insurance. But I could just as easily say that we don't have to pay for health insurance if we decide not to have any income. Both are true, and both are equally reasonable (or not reasonable) arguments.