Category: Impact

Senate Republicans have returned from a seven-week recess with a unified message they plan to repeat until November: Obamacare is imploding.

News of double-digit premium increases in 2017, insurers pulling out of the marketplace, failing co-ops, and low enrollment numbers have handed an opportunity to Senate Republicans who worried about losing the majority in the fall. They get to say, “I told you so,” after a six years of Obamacare messaging, and they get to tell voters that a GOP majority will fix these issues.

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Conservatives should acknowledge that the coverage expansion is real, it is large (though not as large as we were led to expect), and that while it is not necessarily going to make people much healthier, it is probably going to reduce financial hardship among at least some of the people who have gained coverage. That’s significant, though we can still argue about whether the benefit was worth the cost. (If Obamacare were being voted on today, I would still oppose it).

Liberals, however, should also acknowledge uncomfortable facts. The first is that most of the decrease in the uninsured population came in 2014 and 2015, and is now leveling off. Unless younger and healthier people start buying insurance in much larger numbers, we’re probably not going to see huge improvement. The fact that so few young, healthy people are buying insurance may not only mean that the number of uninsured people stops going down. It could mean that that figure starts going up again.

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Six Republican Senators introduced a bill that would exempt consumers living in counties where zero or one insurer is offering plans on the federal exchanges from the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate.

The legislation comes after several recent analyses have shown the number of U.S. counties with one insurer offering plans on the Affordable Care Act exchange is expected to increase next year. Pinal County in Arizona currently has no insurers planning to offer plans on the marketplace. Under the 2010 health care law, people who are able to afford health insurance are required to purchase insurance or pay a fine to the federal government.

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No wonder Politifact awarded President Barack Obama its 2013 “Lie of the Year” award for his Obamacare promise, “If you like your health plan, you can keep it.” My wife has been trying to do exactly that for three years, and has failed every time. But at least she was able to keep her doctor—until now.

I have previously discussed my wife’s struggles to find and keep coverage in the age of Obamacare. It was never a problem before Obama and Democrats decided the government needed to improve access to coverage.

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“You bet I voted for that bill. I’m proud I did it!” yelled Russ Feingold at a Wisconsin campaign stop in 2010. That pride—in ObamaCare—lost the three-term Democratic senator his job. Now his party’s ownership of the health-care law may once again decide the Senate.

ObamaCare is roaring back as a political liability to Democrats in a way not seen since that 2010 wave election. Right in time for this fall’s presidential contest, insurers are bailing out of the government system, leaving millions of voters with dwindling options and skyrocketing premiums. ObamaCare was always destined to crack up, but there is something notable that it comes precisely as so much control of Washington is up for grabs.

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Progress in reducing the number of people without health insurance in the U.S. appears to be losing momentum this year even as rising premiums and dwindling choice are reviving the political blame game over President Barack Obama’s health care law.

The future of the Affordable Care Act hinges on the outcome of the presidential election, and it’s shaping up as a moment of truth for Republicans.

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Massachusetts will be responsible for at least $162 million in new costs over the next decade to fund the federal expansion of health insurance coverage, according to a new report.

The paper from the Pioneer Institute, a free-market-oriented Boston think tank, said that additional spending will squeeze the state budget and divert money from other priorities such as education and transportation.

The costs come in the form of a fee that is part of the Affordable Care Act, which extended insurance coverage to millions of people. The law makes more Americans eligible for Medicaid and provides subsidies to many people on private insurance plans, depending on their level of income. Pioneer said it is the first organization to calculate the long-term costs of the fee.

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Now that the ACA is on the books, and the private-insurance options are on shaky ground, there’s no real reason for proponents of the ACA not to fully embrace the public option. It’s what most of them wanted all along, and the turbulence among the private insurers provides the perfect excuse to pursue it.

The fact that introducing a public option at this stage would only add to the instability of the private options offered on the exchanges is not a reason for the public-option advocates to abandon the idea because they never really wanted a functioning private-insurance marketplace anyway. The goal all along has been government-run health care, even if they haven’t always been willing to admit that.

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Hospital emergency department visits increased in Illinois after the Affordable Care Act took effect — the opposite of what many hoped would happen under the landmark health care law, according to a new study.

“Emergency departments are already overcrowded, and bringing more patients in will continue to make that worse,” said Dr. Scott Dresden, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and the lead author of the study.

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U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell predicted Monday that the federal health care overhaul championed by President Barack Obama is likely to undergo changes next year, regardless of who wins the White House and which party has the upper hand in Congress.

The Kentucky Republican, who has long advocated repealing the Affordable Care Act, told a business audience in his hometown that the law “can’t possibly go on like it is.” He predicted the overhaul “will be revisited by the next president, whoever that is.”

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