The Internal Revenue Service paid out over $572 million in excess Obamacare tax credits and sent incorrect forms to over half a million individuals due to a computer programming error, according a new government report.
The report released by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration on Tuesday inspected the interim results of the IRS’s verification of Obamacare’s Premium Tax Credits, which were created to assist low or medium-income individuals and families to purchase health insurance in the marketplace.
The price of the most popular health plans sold through Maryland’s insurance exchange will jump, on average, by about one quarter next year, fueling questions about whether coverage under the Affordable Care Act will remain affordable in the state and elsewhere.
The 26 percent average increase in monthly premiums are for CareFirst plans, which cover three-fourths of the state residents who have bought insurance under the federal health-care law. The price jump, scheduled for January, is among rate changes that the state’s insurance regulators have approved for plans sold to individual families and small businesses.
Physician-owned hospitals are often vilified in America’s health care system, accused of siphoning the most profitable operations away from other hospitals while leaving them with the sicker and poorer patients. Congress has banned new ones from opening.
But an independent study released Wednesday argues physician-owned hospitals have gotten a bad rap.
The Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare) is replete with bad policies. The so-called Cadillac tax is not one of them.
The tax, which would impose a 40% charge on the value of any employer-provided health insurance above $27,500 for a family, is set to be imposed in 2018. Politicians on both the left and the right have set their sights on repealing the provision. Several Republicans recently announced they would be introducing a bill to repeal it shortly after Congress is back in session, and they hope to bring it to a vote by year’s end.
Insurers have asked for double-digit rate increases for nearly 1 out of every 3 Obamacare plans that will be sold on HealthCare.gov for 2016 coverage, according to a new analysis.
And in three states—Delaware, South Dakota and West Virginia—every plan sold on HealthCare.gov is asking for 10 percent or more hikes in the prices of their premiums for next year, AgileHealthInsurance.com said in its report.
The Affordable Care Act (ACA), despite its laudable policy goals, contains a provision that could negatively impact the health of millions of middle class individuals, and that is the so-called “Cadillac” tax. Increasingly it is being re-evaluated by policy experts, and there is growing sentiment that it should be rewritten or even repealed.
This excise tax was intended to encourage employers to eliminate overly rich healthcare benefits that could lead to excessive, inappropriate utilization of heathcare services and unnecessary healthcare spending. In addition, the revenue from the tax was to serve as a funding source for a portion of the ACA’s insurance subsidies.
Highmark Health said it would reduce its range of offerings on the Affordable Care Act marketplaces, becoming the latest insurer to retrench amid steep financial losses.
The big Pittsburgh-based nonprofit company said it would continue to sell plans related to the federal health overhaul in all of the areas it currently serves, which span Pennsylvania, Delaware and West Virginia. But “we will have less products in the market overall,” said David L. Holmberg, the company’s chief executive, who said Highmark had lost $318 million on its individual health-law plans in the first six months of 2015, after rolling out a very broad array of options that had attracted many consumers with chronic conditions who required costly care.
The state auditor says Hawaii Health Connector “wasted and abused” millions of dollars in public funds on an IT contractor.
In a report released this week, the auditor said the Connector awarded Mansha Consulting LLC $21.6 million in contracts, making Mansha its second-highest paid contractor.
The auditor said the Connector awarded multi-million dollar contracts based on personal recommendations instead of taking steps to ensure it selected the most qualified vendor at the best price.
The Louisiana Department of Insurance has taken over Metairie-based Louisiana Health Cooperative Inc., a nonprofit health insurance company created with $66 million in federal loans.
District Judge Donald Johnson issued an order Tuesday granting the department’s request to place the co-op into rehabilitation. The order allows Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon to take possession and control of the failed insurer. The department’s regulators have been stationed at the co-op since July 29.
The Obama administration will give three Planned Parenthood chapters a combined $1 million in grants to help sign up people for Obamacare.
The grants come as Republican lawmakers want to defund the women’s health organization due to a series of undercover videos detailing the donation of and compensation for aborted fetal parts.