Obamacare To Unveil "Price Shock" One Week Before The Elections

The writing was on the wall long before the largest US insurer, UnitedHealth, decided to pull the plug on Obamacare in mid April. Then, just a week later, Aetna’s CEO said Thursday that his company expects to break even, but legislative fixes are needed to make the marketplace sustainable.

"I think a lot of insurance carriers expected red ink, but they didn’t expect this much red ink,” said Greg Scott, who oversees Deloitte’s health plans practice. "... A number of carriers need double-digit increases."

It gets better.

One week ago Marilyn Tavenner, who until January 2015 ran the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, aka the massive Federal agency that oversaw the rollout of Obamacare and the disastrous implementation of HealthCare.gov and who is now as an insurance lobbyist, said she sees big jumps in Obamacare insurance premiums.

Translation: insurers are not making money, and they need to make money or Obamacare is doomed. Which means even more dramatic rate hikes are about to be unveiled. However, it's not the what but rather the when that is the shock. And, as Politico reports, the timing could not possibly come at a worse time for Democrats.

"Proposed rate hikes are just starting to dribble out, setting up a battle over health insurance costs in a tumultuous presidential election year that will decide the fate of Obamacare."

The headlines are likely to keep coming right up to Election Day since many consumers won’t see actual rates until the insurance marketplaces open Nov. 1 — a week before they go to the polls.

That's right: just one week before the election date, Americans will be served with what now appears will be double (if not more) digit increases in their insurance premiums. Politico is spot on in saying that "the last thing Democrats want to contend with just a week before the 2016 presidential election is an outcry over double-digit insurance hikes as millions of Americans begin signing up for Obamacare."

Read the rest of the story HERE.

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