Obamacare’s Funny Money
This morning the New York Times reports on the confusion and uncertainty regarding Obamacare’s medical-loss ratio rebates. Some individuals in employer plans have received notices that their plans will receive rebates – but the rebates are paid to the plans, and not the individuals, and many employers have not decided what to do with them. This is perhaps unsurprising, because it may not be worth a business’ time and effort to distribute $1.51 rebate checks to all its employees – particularly given that the employee’s share of the premium can often be small. So for both employer and employee, this supposed Obamacare “benefit” may end up being more hassle than it’s worth.
Meanwhile, the Washington Post’s fact checker column this morning gave President Obama three Pinocchios for making yet another misleading claim about Obamacare. In Colorado this week, the President again repeated his old claim that Obamacare will lower premiums by creating Exchanges. This claim essentially riffs off his discussion with Sen. Alexander back at the White House health summit in February 2010. But as we demonstrated at the time, it wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true now. Kessler cites numerous actuarial studies to make his point, but the gist is this: Obamacare FORCES people to buy richer policies, and this Washington-mandated increase in benefits will raise premiums, not lower them. Even Jonathan Gruber, who served as a paid consultant to HHS to create Obamacare, admits that the President’s rhetoric was misleading.
Four years ago, candidate Obama repeatedly promised that he would cut premiums – not slow the rate of growth, but CUT them in absolute terms – by $2,500 per family. No amount of measly rebate checks, or misleading rhetoric, can hide the fact that Obamacare has, by the President’s own standards, spectacularly failed to deliver.