In CHIRblog’s March installment of What We’re Reading, CHIR’s Olivia Hoppe dives into new research that highlights premium trends from the most recent enrollment period, whether employers will continue offering subsidized coverage to employees, the use of the ACA’s tobacco surcharge in the small-group market, and the early effects of the Trump administration’s health insurance policies on coverage.
Earlier today, California, along with 15 state attorneys general filed a motion to intervene in the latest ACA lawsuit, where governors and attorneys general from 20 other states are alleging that the law is unconstitutional. CHIR’s Emily Curran explains how the lawsuit, if successful, is tantamount to ACA “repeal-without-replacement,” resulting in significant losses in coverage and financial harm.
Researchers from Georgetown CHIR and the Urban Institute have released a new report documenting the findings from a series of interviews with insurers participating in the Affordable Care Act marketplaces. We share a summary of key takeaways here.
New proposed rules from the Trump administration would loosen current federal restrictions on short-term, limited duration insurance products. In their latest brief for the State Health & Value Strategies program, CHIR experts Sabrina Corlette, JoAnn Volk, and Justin Giovannelli summarize the proposed rule and its potential impacts and provide a menu of options for states seeking to protect consumers and stabilized their individual markets.
The Trump administration issued proposed rules on February 20, 2018 that rescind Obama-era restrictions on short-term, limited duration insurance products. This action, if finalized, would leave regulation of short-term health plans almost entirely to states. In their latest post for The Commonwealth Fund’s To the Point blog, CHIR experts Dania Palanker, Kevin Lucia, Sabrina Corlette and Maanasa Kona review current short-term plan standards in a sampling of 10 diverse states.
Last week Blue Cross of Idaho filed the first “state-based” health plans, products that don’t comply with the Affordable Care Act’s requirements for coverage offered on the individual market. When a state can’t or won’t enforce federal law, the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) is supposed to step in. CHIR’s Rachel Schwab outlines HHS’ authority to protect the rule of law and ensure that Idaho consumers continue to receive the benefits they are promised under the ACA.
The Trump administration is expected to reverse federal limitations on short-term insurance, which does not have to comply with Affordable Care Act rules like preexisting condition protections. In their latest post for the Commonwealth Fund’s To the Point blog, CHIR’s Dania Palanker, Kevin Lucia, Sabrina Corlette, and Maanasa Kona examine how ten states currently regulate the short-term insurance market.
Idaho has just published rules for new, “state-based” health plans that are exempt from many of the Affordable Care Act protections for people with pre-existing conditions. CHIR’s Sabrina Corlette examines the legality of Idaho’s action, as well as its potential impact on consumers and the health insurance marketplace.
The final 2019 Notice of Benefit and Payment Parameters has been submitted to the White House for review. The initial proposal included a number of changes to the Affordable Care Act’s essential health benefits, marketplace operations, and other consumer protections. In this final post in a series of blogs analyzing public comments on the proposed rules, CHIR’s Dania Palanker examines responses from Departments of Insurance and state-based marketplaces to better understand who the rule could impact.
Heading into open enrollment for 2018 marketplace coverage, experts predicted far fewer people would sign up for coverage. Despite the obstacles working against a successful open enrollment, sign-ups came close to last year’s tally: federally facilitated marketplaces (FFMs) logged 8.8 million plan selections, including close to 2.5 million new consumers, by the close of open enrollment on December 15th, nearing the 9.2 million plan selection from the previous year in just half the time. CHIR’s Olivia Hoppe and JoAnn Volk take a look at what explains the better-than-expected results.
The opinions expressed here are solely those of the individual blog post authors and do not represent the views of Georgetown University, the Center on Health Insurance Reforms, any organization that the author is affiliated with, or the opinions of any other author who publishes on this blog.
