House Energy and Commerce Committee Republicans seemed surprised last week when representatives of the insurance industry reported that they didn’t have enough data yet to forecast prices for next year’s health insurance exchanges, the market was not about to blow up, and that so far at least 80% of consumers have paid for the health insurance policies they purchased on the exchanges.
The executives also reported there are still serious back-end problems with HealthCare.gov––particularly in being able to reconcile the people the carriers think are covered and the people the government thinks are covered.
These are all things that you have read about a number of times on this blog.The insurance companies are doing their best to make Obamacare work.
Why?
Because if they want to be in the individual and small group markets, Obamacare is the only game in town––it has a monopoly over these markets. The same rules that apply to the individual market also apply to the even larger small group health insurance market.
Unless Obamacare is repealed this is the business reality insurance companies have to deal with. So, you make the best of it.
Republicans are right to think Obamacare is unpopular. The latest Real Clear Politics average of all major polls taken since open-enrollment closed still has 41% of those surveyed favorable to the law and 52% opposed to the law––about as bad it is always been.
But Obamacare is not going to be repealed. The sooner Republicans come to understand that the better for them.
I really think Democrats have the potential to take back, or at least neutralize, the health care issue by the November elections if Republicans aren’t careful.