Sen. Sasse: Obamacare going to be more expensive, with fewer options, this year

(BigGovernment.news) As bad as Obamacare has screwed up the health insurance industry, things are going to get much worse this year, according to U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb.

Affordable Care Act exchange customers in nearly two-thirds of U.S. counties have three or fewer insurers to choose from in 2016, Sasse said in a report last week that argues President Obama dramatically oversold his signature legislation as something that would spur competition.

The Sasse analysis says that web-based insurance exchanges established by Obamacare took in nearly 6 percent fewer insurers competing on them this year than last year. The report also said it was better to examine county-by-county data in order to gauge how people are doing under Obamacare, which requires Americans to buy health insurance, the Washington Times reported.

“Facts don’t spin. Families are forced to choose between fewer insurers on the ACA’s exchanges,” said Sasse, who worked as a health policy counselor during the Bush administration. “Competition is good for consumers — this new data should be a wakeup call that healthcare in this country is headed in the wrong direction.”

The Department of Health and Human Services, which manages the Affordable Care Act, said nine in 10 returning consumers are able to choose from three or more insurers this year. Department officials also said examining county data rather than where people live is misleading. Also, officials said that Americans were locked out of the insurance market because of pre-existing medical conditions before Obamacare, meaning they had no choices at all.

• More: Obamacare is blowing up the health insurance industry – and our wallets
  

But Sasse’s analysis, which counted parent insurers, not subsidiaries, said that customers in more than one-third of the nation’s counties, or 36 percent, had only one or two insurers to choose from for coverage in 2016. Another 27 percent of counties only had three insurers to choose from, meaning that 63 percent of counties topped out at three.

What’s more, Sasse’s analysis said, the lack of options is a primary driver of monthly premium hikes and higher deductibles around the country as well.

In a recent enrollment report, HHS said the average exchange customer in the 38 states that are utilizing the HealthCare.gov exchange is paying $106 per month after subsidy for coverage this year, up from $101 per month last year.

Unsubsidized customers, however, are seeing much higher rate and deductible hikes, CNBC reported in November.

“There are drastically different rates for the subsidized and the unsubsidized,” Kev Coleman, who heads research and data at HealthPocket, told the network.

“For people who are on the outside of subsidies, what had been a very expensive market has become even more expensive.”

Republicans in Congress have pledged to repeal Obamacare and replace it with a more market-oriented system. GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump has also laid out a repeal-and-reform plan, urging Congress – among other things – to get rid of the individual mandate [requiring the purchase of health insurance], allow insurance companies to sell across state lines, and allow Americans to deduct their health premiums from their taxes, among other proposals.

See also:

Washington Times

CNBC

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