Mandated benefits and regulations, such as guaranteed issue and community rating, have driven up the cost of health insurance in New Jersey, write Devon Herrick and John O'Keefe, for the National Center for Policy Analysis. For example, a healthy 25-year-old male could purchase a policy for $960 a year in Kentucky but would pay about $5,880 in New Jersey.

Instead of community rating and guaranteed issue, New Jersey should allow insurers to charge risk-based premiums, write Herrick and O'Keefe. In order to cover residents too poor to afford private coverage, the state could request a block grant for all federal Medicaid funds, which would give New Jersey the flexibility to provide care in the most efficient way.

The state's residents should also be allowed to purchase lower-cost health insurance sold in other states. This would make coverage more affordable by injecting competition into the local market and by allowing residents to purchase insurance without New Jersey's expensive mandates.