Other than the egg-laying exercise surrounding the ACO regulations, 2011 was a quiet year among Washington health policy experts until June 6 when McKinsey released the results ofa survey of employer plans under the Affordable Care Act. The McKinsey study found that roughly 30 percent of employers were considering dropping their employee insurance coverage and encouraging their employees to receive federally subsidized health insurance through the Exchanges created in the Affordable Care Act. This compared to low- to mid-single digit estimated drop rates based upon economic modeling by the Urban Institute, Lewin and, importantly, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).
To judge by the storm of angry political reaction, you would have thought that McKinsey had advocated mass psychedelic drug use. Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) sent McKinsey a letter demanding that the firm disclose its methods and questioning its motives. There followed a flurry of hostile press coverage of the study, echoed in the progressive blogosphere. Horrified, McKinsey released its study methodology, survey instrument, and tabulations of responses.
Why such a sharp reaction? If McKinsey turns out to be right about employer intentions, the cost estimates of the federal subsidies for individuals to purchase coverage through the Exchanges (roughly $777 billion from 2012 to 2021 according to CBO’s March, 2011 analysis) are far too low, making the program even more vulnerable to Republican efforts to cancel it. And if a third of employers drop coverage, President Obama’s pledge that “if you like your health insurance coverage, you can keep it” won’t look so great either.
