Come September, a feature of the ACA will kick in that could spell the end of affordable “mini-med” coverage plans for low-income workers. Such plans typically provide access to a limited number of health-care providers and cap annual benefits payouts, but a provision in Obamacare bans insurance companies from doing the latter. That could spur massive spikes in premiums that put the mini-med plans beyond the reach of the very consumers for which they are designed.
And remember, the up to 1 million workers who will be affected by the provision won’t have exchanges or subsidies to fall back on for years, thanks to the tax-and-regulate now, pay later structure of Obamacare.
As Politico reports:
A cadre of employers and trade associations, including 7-Eleven, Lowe’s, the National Restaurant Association, the National Retail Federation and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, have asked the administration to allow the plans — at least through 2014, when the insurance exchanges are set up and tax credits become available for low-wage workers.
[. . . ]
If the ban is strictly implemented, “this population would likely be left with no coverage until 2014,” employer groups wrote last week in a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis. “While it surely was not the intent of Congress or the administration to increase the number of uninsured, this provision will likely produce exactly this result for some of the most vulnerable of our population, e.g., lower-wage, part-time, seasonal and temporary workers who can only obtain and afford limited-benefit medical insurance coverage.”
The letter was signed by nearly three dozen organizations, including many trade groups that did not support the Democrats’ legislation. Industry groups estimate that about 1.4 million people use these plans.
[. . . ]
“It’s not top-notch coverage by any stretch, but it is better than no coverage,” said Neil Trautwein, a health care lobbyist at the National Retail Federation. “There’s slight irony, given the president’s repeated assertion that if you enjoy your coverage you can keep it, that this would take the coverage away from part-time employees until 2014.”
Didn’t anyone tell Mr. Trautwein, you’ve got to pass the bill to find out what’s in it?