◼ HHS quietly repeals the individual purchase rule for two more years. - Wall St. Journal
ObamaCare's implementers continue to roam the battlefield and shoot their own wounded, and the latest casualty is the core of the Affordable Care Act—the individual mandate. To wit, last week the Administration quietly excused millions of people from the requirement to purchase health insurance or else pay a tax penalty.
This latest political reconstruction has received zero media notice, and the Health and Human Services Department didn't think the details were worth discussing in a conference call, press materials or fact sheet. Instead, the mandate suspension was buried in an unrelated rule that was meant to preserve some health plans that don't comply with ObamaCare benefit and redistribution mandates. Our sources only noticed the change this week....
Keep in mind that the White House argued at the Supreme Court that the individual mandate to buy insurance was indispensable to the law's success, and President Obama continues to say he'd veto the bipartisan bills that would delay or repeal it. So why are ObamaCare liberals silently gutting their own creation now?
The answers are the implementation fiasco and politics. HHS revealed Tuesday that only 940,000 people signed up for an ObamaCare plan in February, bringing the total to about 4.2 million, well below the original 5.7 million projection. The predicted "surge" of young beneficiaries isn't materializing even as the end-of-March deadline approaches, and enrollment decelerated in February.
Meanwhile, a McKinsey & Company survey reports that a mere 27% of people joining the exchanges were previously uninsured through February. The survey also found that about half of people who shopped for a plan but did not enroll said premiums were too expensive, even though 80% of this group qualify for subsidies. Some substantial share of the people ObamaCare is supposed to help say it is a bad financial value. You might even call it a hardship.
DRUDGE HEADLINES:
Pop Singer Lance Bass Visits White House to Discuss ObamaCare...
OK Man Loses Insurance Due to Law, Owes $100K in Bills...
900,000 Obamacare 'enrollees' still haven't paid for coverage?
42-sign ups a minute needed to reach goal...
OR exchange fails to attract young...
FLASHBACK: Feds drop $3.2m on ads featuring guitar-strumming hipsters...
WSJ: Secret Mandate Exemption...
HHS: We Lack 'Statutory Authority' to Extend Open Enrollment Period...
RUBIO: Dem goal is single-payer system...
