HHS plans to save taxpayer dollars by curtailing waste and requiring better performance in the ACA Navigator program which pays organizations to enroll people in ObamaCare coverage. The HHS analysis showed that in 2016 “One [Navigator] grantee received $200,000 and enrolled ONE person in Obamacare.” The top 10 most costly Navigators spent a total of $2.77 million to enroll 314 people in Obamacare—costing an average of $8,800 to enroll each person (on top of tax credits and other subsidies). In the upcoming enrollment period, CMS plans to spend $10 million on promotional activities—consistent with similar spending on Medicare Advantage and Medicare Part D.
. . .
Health and Human Services announced that the agency will alter the funding structure for ObamaCare “navigators.” These are the community outfits the Obama Administration paid to steer folks through the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies and penalties. Last year the Obama Administration handed out $62.5 million in grants for open enrollment for 2017, and the period arrives again in November.
One grantee took in $200,000 to enroll a grand total of one person. The top 10 most expensive navigators collected $2.77 million to sign up 314 people, and it would have been much cheaper to offer to pay all of their premiums for a year. All told, the navigators last year enrolled about 81,000 people, less than 1% of the total.
The Trump Administration will tie grants to performance.
. . .
Major bipartisan accomplishments in federal policy feel like a rarity these days. But it was just over 20 years ago that the parties came together to pass significant, positive reforms to our nation’s cash assistance program for families in poverty. The 1996 welfare-reform law, passed by a Republican Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton, significantly strengthened work requirements in a new program, now known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). In the years following the law’s enactment, child-poverty rates dropped significantly and employment among poor mothers increased, while teen pregnancy and abortion rates continued to fall. Policies that encouraged work succeeded in achieving the intended, positive result: fewer Americans in poverty and more Americans providing for themselves.
. . .
Despite the setbacks of the past eight months, including the inability of Republicans to agree on a single alternative to the ACA, it is still not too late for this Congress to pass health care reform legislation.
At this point in the Obama administration’s first term, the ACA hadn’t been passed – not even out of committee – and Democrats weren’t the least bit united either. That had, and that point in time, three separate bills – quite different from each other – going through different House committees, and three additional very different bills going through three different Senate committees. In addition, there were numerous other proposals introduced by various Democrats, which had been sidelined by their own leadership.
. . .