Oregon Health Plans Ordered to Raise Rates!
All that complaining about double-digit Obamacare rate hikes for 2016? Well, at least one Insurance Commissioner thinks they’re not high enough. Plans in Oregon have lost so much money on Obamacare that the state’s Insurance Commissioner fears for their solvency unless they hike premiums more than they have asked for:
The Oregon Insurance Division says it is pushing health insurers to charge higher individual rates in 2016 because they are reporting huge underwriting losses for 2014.
The insurers collected just $703 million in premiums for 2014 and spent $830 million on 2014 claims, officials say.
(Alison Bell, “5 Oregon insurers under orders to raise their rates,” LifeHealthPro, June 19, 2015)
I have been deeply skeptical that insurance commissioners would significantly cut back the rate increases as long as the insurers were open and honest about the payouts, which they are legally required to be. The reason I was skeptical is pretty simple- the ACA market is a closed one within a state- no commissioner who wants to keep his job is going to run the risk of that market having no participant on the insurer side.