So how is that ObamaCare program working out?
Excerpted from today\’s editorial at Investors Business Daily:
The Department of Health and Human Service\’s Inspector General audited ObamaCare subsidy payments from January through April of last year. It found that HHS basically couldn\’t verify if the payment amounts were correct, because it lacked internal controls to do so.
As the IG report put it, HHS “did not have systems in place to ensure that financial assistance payments were made on behalf of confirmed enrollees and in the correct amounts.”
In other words, it might have made subsidy payments to people who signed up but didn\’t pay their premiums. Or it could have paid too much or too little.
Because of that, HHS “cannot verify the accuracy of the nearly $2.8 billion it authorized for financial assistance payments during our audit period.”
Now keep in mind that, according to the Congressional Budget Office, ObamaCare paid out a total of $17 billion in subsidies for all of last year.
So that means HHS can\’t be sure whether 16% of its subsidy checks were in the correct amounts. Even for government work, this is bad.
…despite spending roughly $2 billion on the Healthcare.gov echange, the “back end” – which was supposed to automatically figure out subsidy payments to be paid to insurers on behalf of enrollees who qualified for them – remains unfinished.
All of this probably comes as news to most people in the country, because the mainstream press didn\’t bother to report the audit\’s findings.
Having already decided that ObamaCare is a big success – mainly because President Obama declared it so – they apparently see no reason to bother reporting such bad news … even if it involves the possible misappropriation of nearly $3 billion.
Well, look at the bright side. The editorial was kind enough not to mention the double-digit premium increases that signees in state after state are being hit with. And it didn\’t mention what will happen when the waivers on who has to provide ObamaCare – waivers that are clearly outside the constitution – expire.
This has been, and remains, an unworkable monstrosity. Even if mainstream media dilligently avoid telling the public as much.
But there is more.
The Supreme Court – possibly as soon as today – will rule on whether ObamaCare clients in the 34 states which did not create their own exchanges can get subsidies at all…which, based on the language of the legislation, it seems clear they cannot.
If the Supreme Court rules against ObamaCare, something like 8 million people will suddenly have huge premium increases…and, presumably, owe back the premium subsidies already paid on their behalf.
Republicans – wisely (a word I don\’t often use about Republicans) – are waiting in the wings with proposed legislation that would keep the subsidies afloat in some form for two years, after which ObamaCare would be replaced by something more workable.
I don\’t know if the Republican alternative would be good or bad. But I do know that a) it makes a decision against ObamaCare easier for the Supreme Court because it won\’t leave 8 million people in the lurch and b) politically, it is something that can be told to the 8 million people other than “you don\’t have insurance anymore, have a nice day”.
Obviously, we\’ll talk more about this once the Supreme Court decision comes down.
