Obamacare success still elusive
Published December 15, 2015
Editorial by Fayetteville Observer, December 15, 2015.
Time's up, Obamacare participants. If you're signing up or switching plans, today's the last day to enroll in next year's policies.
Paying attention is the smart thing to do, since many existing policies purchased through the Affordable Care Act's Health Insurance Marketplace will see substantial premium increases next year.
One participant interviewed for in Saturday's Observer said she was paying $5 a month for her policy this year and discovered her plan would cost $150 a month next year - 30 times higher. But when she sat down with a "marketplace navigator" at a local nonprofit, she found similar coverage for about $6 a month.
The problem is that Obamacare isn't yet working the way it was envisioned - no surprise, given the controversy over the system and relentless demonization of it by politicians at every level. The people who are enrolling are the ones who really need it - people with health problems. Healthy people continue to avoid it, which could imperil the program's long-term viability.
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, the largest health insurer in the state, requested premium increases averaging nearly 35 percent for next year. This is driving many customers to United Healthcare, which entered the North Carolina exchange last year and appears to have captured considerable business. But its parent company questions whether it can continue.
That could change quickly if more people - especially younger, healthier people - participate in Obamacare. That could begin happening in 2016, when the penalty for failing to have health insurance jumps from the higher of $325 per person or 2 percent of household income, to $695 per person or 2.5 percent of household income. For a young, healthy North Carolinian, the penalty is becoming more expensive than an insurance premium.
If more people sign up, that will solve the other part of the problem: The demand will rise, so more insurance companies will move to supply policies, at increasingly competitive rates.
But it's hard to see just yet whether Obamacare will succeed in North Carolina. Participation levels are still too low, insurance companies too scarce and opposition politicians too shrill - and apparently not yet ready to offer a viable alternative that will move us toward more universal health coverage, a goal all political philosophies can embrace.
We hope all of those conditions improve in 2016.
