The White House insisted on Wednesday that healthcare costs are falling after a member of President Obama’s Cabinet said some people could see their insurance premiums rise under the Affordable Care Act.
"I would actually point to the results that we're already seeing from the Affordable Care Act, which is a savings of $2.1 billion, and the analysis from the [Congressional Budget Office] that actually says, in the future, we're gonna see rates that are lower for higher benefits," deputy press secretary Josh Earnest said Wednesday.
Health and Human Service Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told reporters late Tuesday that “there may be a higher cost associated with getting into that market" where "folks will be moving into a really fully insured product for the first time," according to The Wall Street Journal.
That made Sebelius the first Obama administration official to acknowledge that insurance premiums could increase under the law.
Earnest said he had not read Sebelius’s remarks, but pointed to a blog post from Alan Krueger, the chairman of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, about the slowed growth of healthcare spending in recent years.
"[He] said that, 'Each year from 2009 to 2011 national health expenditure data shows the real rate of annual growth in overall health spending was between 3 percent and 3.1 percent,' which is actually the lowest rate of growth since reporting began in 1960," Earnest said, sidestepping the question of whether there will be an increase in premium costs for some people as a result of the law.
Earnest provided a sharper critique of a report by the Society of Actuaries that showed insurers would be on the hook an average 32 percent more per claims on individual insurance policies because of the law. The study also suggested those cost increases would be passed along to some consumers.The White House spokesman said he wasn't "particularly surprised" that a study "conducted by a health insurance company that's critical of the Affordable Care Act" would come up with such results.
"The reason that the Affordable Care Act was put in place was to ensure that we were expanding access to healthcare for every American, but also because we wanted to actually protect consumers who were repeatedly victimized by insurance companies," Earnest said. "So it's not particularly surprising to me that an insurance company would conduct a study that was critical of a piece of legislation that was promising to hold them accountable for their actions."
Major parts of the healthcare law are slated for implementation next year. Republican critics have argued that the bill will result in increased rates, especially in the individual and small-group insurance markets.
In the same interview where she conceded that premiums could rise, Sebelius argued individuals "are really going to see much better benefit for the money that they're spending," and said government subsidies would help offset some price increases.
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