Thanks to the Affordable Care Act’s provision requiring governmental review of health insurance premium hikes, state health insurance regulators are currently in the process of trying to pin down just what it is that makes an insurance premium hike “unreasonable.” Turns out no one really knows for sure—and, in fact, no increase at all might qualify: According to a staffer with the Minnesota Department of Commerce, “even a zero increase might be unreasonable, if an insurer was at the same time cutting benefits offered in the policy.” [Bold added.]

Technically, the federal government doesn’t yet have the authority to reject rates, but a proposal from Sen. Dianne Fienstein to regulate health insurance like a public utility makes it clear that’s where this effort is leading. How’d that work out in Massachusetts, where Governor Deval Patrick recently rejected about 90 percent of this year’s proposed rate hikes? Not so well