All those threats of Obamacare sabotage from popular vote loser Donald Trump have actually been sabotage in and of themself, a new study shows, and the only people being punished by that are the people on Obamacare. The administration's actions have trigged double-digit premium increases in Affordable Care Act policies, the study concludes.
The analysis released Thursday by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that mixed signals from President Donald Trump have created uncertainty "far outside the norm," leading insurers to seek higher premium increases for 2018 than would otherwise have been the case. […]
Researchers from the Kaiser foundation looked at proposed premiums for a benchmark silver plan across major metropolitan areas in 20 states and Washington, D.C. Overall, they found that 15 of those cities will see increases of 10 percent or more next year.
The highest: a 49 percent jump in Wilmington, Delaware. The only decline: a 5 percent reduction in Providence, Rhode Island.
About 10 million people who buy policies through HealthCare.gov and state-run markets are potentially affected, as well as another 5 million to 7 million who purchase individual policies on their own.
Most of the people who buy their policies through the ACA exchanges will be insulated from those premium hikes because of the federal subsidies provided to them under the law. It's those 5-7 million who have their own individual policies who are going to be hit the hardest. There will also be less choice for individual market shoppers—there will be an average of 4.6 insurers participating in the states studied in 2018, as opposed to 5.7 insurers this year.
Why the hikes and the companies pulling out of selling plans? Trump and the Republican Congress.
"The vast majority of companies in states with detailed rate filings have included some language around the uncertainty, so it is likely that more companies will revise their premiums to reflect uncertainty in the absence of clear answers from Congress or the administration," the report said. Once premiums are set, they’re generally in place for a whole year. […]
"In many cases that means insurers are adding double-digit premium increases on top of what they otherwise would have requested," said Cynthia Cox, a co-author of the Kaiser report. "In many cases, what we are seeing is an additional increase due to the political uncertainty."
Remember when Trump and the Republicans promised that insurance would be more affordable for everyone? And Trump's promise that there would be insurance for everyone? Yeah, that.