Health insurers such as WellPoint Inc. and Humana Inc. stand to gain $5.5 billion from the government next year to cover losses from Obamacare in a program the law’s opponents label a bailout.
The money, outlined in President Barack Obama’s proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins in October, is designated to help insurers who find the cost of the law higher than expected, based on the percentage of older, sicker people who sign up compared with younger enrollees.
Under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, insurers who record a profit of 3 percent or more on their Obamacare business would put some of their gains into a government-controlled fund. Companies whose claims cost at least 3 percent more than their premium revenue can access the pool. While it isn’t clear in Obama’s budget how much he expects to collect from insurers who profit on business, the $5.5 billion may signal that more insurers will be withdrawing money from the fund than are adding to it.
“If you want to insure the uninsured, and you want to set up a competitive marketplace and drive health system improvement, you’re not going to do that without off-loading some of the risk for insurance providers,” Dan Mendelson, the president of Avalere Health, a Washington consulting firm, said in a telephone interview.
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In a post earlier today someone stated that Obamacare has been upheld by the Supreme Court so it's the law of the land. Please note that Prohibition was also the law of the land and was repealed. Obamacare can be repealed as well.
ReplyDeletecan We see who is invested in these Companies and how much they donated to Obama/Reid/Pelosi Inc?
ReplyDeleteno the law was determined to be a tax --not upheld-- actually it is an illegal tax since the tax language was added in by Harry Reid and NEVER was voted upon in the House-- then again the IRS and Income Taxation was never passed the appropriate way by presenting it as a Constitutional Amendment either-- and the Federal Reserve never went through proper channels either-- everyone in Government should be recalled and impeached because of this--whether we are happy with who our guy is or not
ReplyDeleteThey have accountants that will be able to show a 3.99% profit - so they don't have to put anything in to the pools....or, they'll show a 6% loss so they can with draw...
ReplyDeleteEither way, the taxpayers will be subsidizing the insurance companies...that made this deal with our politicians in the first place.