Congressional Republicans who repeatedly pledged to repeal and replace Obamacare instead are racing today to rescue the law with truckloads of federal cash. Their plan: a multi-billion-dollar bailout of health insurers that sell Obamacare policies. In return, the insurers promise to reduce premiums just in time for November’s elections. Congress shouldn’t jump at this politically tantalizing … [Read more...] about Breaking promises: GOP resuscitate Obamacare with massive bailout
How Obamacare Raised Premiums
The seismic effects of the Affordable Care Act on insurance markets continue to be felt nearly eight years after its enactment. Premiums for individual coverage more than doubled between 2013 and 2017. Much of that increase resulted from Obamacare’s new regulations. Some regulations—such as essential health benefits and actuarial value requirements—had discrete effects on premiums. A cluster of … [Read more...] about How Obamacare Raised Premiums
Resetting the Scoreboard: Why CBO Should Abandon Its Flawed Analysis of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation
One of the impediments to repealing and replacing Obamacare has been a belief by the Congressional Budget Office that substantial federal savings will be achieved by innovative demonstration projects in Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program called for under the law. The CBO bases this conclusion about these savings not on analyses of projects that have been undertaken but … [Read more...] about Resetting the Scoreboard: Why CBO Should Abandon Its Flawed Analysis of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation
The GOP’s Coming Obamacare Capitulation
If conservatives don’t coalesce behind a new repeal plan soon soon, they will find themselves bystanders as their Republican colleagues link arms with Democrats. Congressional Republicans were elected to repeal Obamacare. They may run this year as the politicians who saved it. Since late last year, GOP leaders have been planning to pump tens of billions of dollars’ worth of new federal spending … [Read more...] about The GOP’s Coming Obamacare Capitulation
Senate Should Repeal Regressive Tax on the Uninsured
Senate Democrats who fret over the distributional effects of tax cuts should thank their GOP colleagues for giving them the chance this week to vote on repealing one of the most regressive taxes: the Obamacare tax on the uninsured.This tax disproportionately falls on those with incomes less than $50,000, while exempting many households earning six-figure salaries. Many who qualify for subsidies … [Read more...] about Senate Should Repeal Regressive Tax on the Uninsured
Obamacare’s Individual Mandate Is Repealing Itself
The Senate this week is expected to vote on a tax bill that includes a controversial provision to repeal Obamacare’s tax penalty on the uninsured. Democrats and some conservative policy analysts fret that if Congress scuttles the so-called individual mandate, insurance premiums will rise. The reverse may be closer to the truth: Premiums for Obamacare policies next year will be so high that … [Read more...] about Obamacare’s Individual Mandate Is Repealing Itself
The Hatch-Brady bill offers a way to make health insurance affordable
The Oct. 26 editorial “Health-care reform that pays off” unfairly maligned a bill introduced by two committee chairmen as “dismantling major pieces of Obamacare.” It does nothing of the sort. Like the bill proposed by Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.) that the editorial praised, a bill from Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Tex.) would appropriate money … [Read more...] about The Hatch-Brady bill offers a way to make health insurance affordable
Obamacare Is Uninsuring the Insured
The law expanded coverage among the poor at the expense of coverage among the middle class. The number of people with individual health-insurance coverage is shrinking. Despite $146 billion in federal subsidies to low-income households and well-capitalized insurers, 2.6 million fewer people had individual policies in March 2017 than in March 2016, a drop of nearly 15 percent. The most … [Read more...] about Obamacare Is Uninsuring the Insured