As President Donald J. Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin and other members of the House reset on the failed attempt to pass an Obamacare repeal-and-replace measure last week, a new cost analysis of premiums under the Affordable Care Act shows why it needs to go.
As reported by The Daily Signal, Americans are paying up to 68 percent more for their health insurance premiums than before Obamacare became the law of the land, and frankly, that is unaffordable for a growing number of families.
There are a number of reasons why health insurance premiums rose so dramatically under Obamacare, and none of them had anything at all to do with “greed.” The analysis shows that the primary reason for the dramatic increases was the massive number of new regulations Obamacare imposed on insurance markets, warping and distorting the free market.
“While the American Health Care Act does repeal some Obamacare regulations, it does not go far enough,” writes Drew Gonshorowski, a policy analyst in the Center for Data Analysis at The Heritage Foundation, publisher of The Daily Signal. (RELATED: CBO was wrong over Obamacare sign-ups – or half-right, depending on how you look at it.)
He developed a chart that gives estimates of the negative impact the not-so-Affordable Care Act’s myriad of regulations have had on monthly health insurance premiums.
A summary of ACA mandates listed on the chart includes:
— Health insurer tax at 2 percent
— Health Exchange fee, which rises from 1.4-2.3 percent now to 2.8 percent-3.7 percent by 2023
— Guaranteed coverage added 15-30 percent onto premiums
— Sickness coverage added 4 percent
— Essential health benefits put on another 8 percent in costs
Gonshorowski notes that increases are not universal around the country. In Oregon, for instance, though reinsurance rates have climbed across the country, they initially fell there by 8 percent, and eventually rates fell 2 percent.
However, in Ohio, changes in the overall sickness covered nationally by newly uninsured (no, Obamacare never did cover everyone, as it was supposed to do), were much higher at 35-40 percent than the national average of 4 percent (as seen above).
The age of insured has also driven up premium expenses, he noted, adding that Obamacare “disrupted the natural order” through the mandating rules for age banding, “which disproportionately harmed young people.” Gonshorowski explained that “age banding” is in reference to how much the most expensive plans can cost versus the least expensive, with costs rising the older the insured becomes.
Under Obamacare mandates, the ratio was set at 1-to-3, so that the highest-costing plans could only be three times more than the cheapest plans. And though older Americans saw less dramatic premium increases – due in part to age banding and the fact that Obamacare is nearing a death spiral – young people have come out on the worse end of the spectrum. (RELATED: The one element that should be in ANY Obamacare repeal is freedom.)
“Overall,” he writes, “young people can expect to have rate increases between 58.9 percent and 91.8 percent using national averages.” That’s absurd, considering that before Obamacare, young people had much lower rates because they were generally much healthier than older Americans.
In addition to the ridiculous pricing mandates, the Obamacare law’s “essential health benefits” – that is, the coverage package that every plan must include, even if the consumer doesn’t want certain things covered or doesn’t need certain coverage (like men having to pay for maternity coverage) – are also driving up costs dramatically.
In summary, when accounting for all the rules and regulations and mandates imposed on the health insurance industry alone by Obamacare, costs for premiums, on average, have climbed 44.5-68 percent.
“That number is even higher when factoring all the other adverse effects of Obamacare,” Gonshorowski wrote.
Clearly, there is much at stake in repealing this monstrosity of a law, which will continue to harm Americans until it goes away for good.
J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.
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