A Rand Corp. report released Thursday says health care premiums next year largely will be unchanged for individuals and small businesses, a boost to Obamacare supporters a little more than a month before consumers can begin shopping for coverage.
Overall, the analysis predicted the Affordable Care Act will lead to an increase in health insurance coverage and higher enrollment among those who buy individual policies. Small group enrollment in Pennsylvania would drop slightly, but the individual market would more than triple, from 3.7 percent of non-elderly adults to 11.9 percent.
“Our analysis shows that rates for policies in the individual market are likely to vary from state to state, with some experiencing increases and some experiencing decreases in cost,” said Christine Eibner, the study’s lead author and a senior economist at Rand, a nonprofit research organization. “But our analysis found no widespread trend toward sharply higher prices in the individual market.”
But Elizabeth Stelle, a policy analyst with the conservative Commonwealth Foundation in Harrisburg, said the report is “clearly suspect from the beginning” because it was sponsored by the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, a division of the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Further, she said, other studies have come to conclusions opposite of Rand’s. Stelle cited a report looking at eight states that already have released premium rates for next year. It found that the cheapest rates available next year are on average 122 percent more expensive than the cheapest rates this year — although the investors.com report Stelle cited notes that the current low-cost plans have higher deductibles and offer “skimpier” benefits than those that will be offered in 2014.
Because Obamacare will force insurers to squeeze prices for older adults, “you’re going to see premiums going up for young people across the board,” Stelle added.
Read more.