Ken Berwitz
The Washington Post reportsthat nearly 1 in 4 of the people who picked a health care plan for 2015 throughObamacare marketplaces have dropped or lost their coverage. As of the end ofJune, 9.9 million people were paying for health care plans they obtained throughthe federal or state-run insurance exchanges created by the Obamacarelegislation. That\’s a decline from the 12.7 million who signed up for a 2015plan.
What explains the drop?The obvious explanation, and the main one cited by the Post, is that a huge numberof those who signed up either failed to pay their premiums or paid them for awhile but then stopped.
Here\’s another factor thatcontributed to the decline. In more than 400,000 cases, federal healthofficials cut off coverage to people because they did not provide proof thattheir citizenship or naturalization status made them eligible for Obamacare.
(and)…we should keep inmind that the 9.9 million figure for those who have health insurance throughObamacare exchanges doesn\’t represent the number of people who would not havenon-Medicaid insurance in the absence of Obamacare. Many Americans lost their employer-based coverage due to Obamacare. So the number ofAmericans who have non-Medicaid health insurance thanks to Obamacare, thoughsubstantial, is considerably lower than 9.9 million.
In judging success or failure, consider the objective. Not the stated objective, but the actual objective.The stated objective of this ridiculous, flagrantly unconstitutional “law” was to see that all persons can acquire health insurance and treatment on demand, and bring down costs. This, of course, isn\’t possible.The actual objective was to give the federal government a method by which it could seize control of whole industries and as much of its citizens lives as possible, and leave them both without any recourse at all.By that metric, things seem to be going pretty well.
