Campaign Action
Insurers participating in the Affordable Care Act's markets are having to file their proposed rate increases for next year, and as they file in, states are seeing 30 percent increases as the norm. There's one reason for the hikes everyone agrees to: Republicans. Between Congress's Trumpcare fiasco and popular vote loser Donald Trump's sabotage, there's just too much uncertainty and insurers have to hedge their bets by increasing rates.
Big insurers in Idaho, West Virginia, South Carolina, Iowa and Wyoming are seeking to raise premiums by averages close to 30% or more, according to preliminary rate requests published Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Major marketplace players in New Mexico, Tennessee, North Dakota and Hawaii indicated they were looking for average increases of 20% or more. […]
Together the filings show the uncertainty in the health-insurance marketplaces as insurers around the U.S. try to make decisions about rates and participation for next year amid open questions about changes that could come from the Trump administration and Congress.
Insurers face a mid-August deadline for completing their rates. The companies have until late September to sign federal agreements to offer plans in 2018. In some cases, insurers warn, the figures revealed by federal regulators may not reflect their up-to-date thinking.
It's not just the cost-saving reduction payments that are at issue for insurers, they're also concerned that will ignore the fact that the ACA is the law of the land, and take actions like refusing to enforce the individual mandate to get younger, healthier people to sign up, or refusing to publicize enrollment dates, or causing confusion and uncertainty for current enrollees (which may or may not have been a "technical" issue). The Trump administration appears to be hell-bent on doing whatever it can to actually subvert the law.
Meanwhile, the National Governors Association is urging Trump and the Republican Congress to fix it, starting with the "first critical step ... to fully fund CSRs (cost-sharing reduction payments) for the remainder of calendar year 2017 through 2018." They see the potential disaster, as do some congressional Republicans, a group that's destined to grow. Consensus is building that the only solution at this point is making Obamacare work. The question now is whether anyone can control the toddler in the White House.