U.S. health insurers to pay $330 million in premium rebates

[Bill USA]

29. here's some perspective: Premiums wld hve been $3.8 bil HIGHER if MLR remained the same as 2011's

NOte: MLR is the Medical Loss Ratio or how much the insurance companies pay out to policyholders to pay for covered medical costs relative to the insurance companies revenues - i.e. total premiums charged.

... from the same article ...
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/07/24/us-usa-healthcare-insurance-idUSKBN0FT09F20140724
(emphases my own)

The total rebate figure is less than last year, when the insurers were told to send out $500 million under the law. The decline is a trend that the government said shows that more insurers are charging lower premiums than they would have if the law was not passed.

The healthcare law was passed in 2010 and the medical loss ratio, or MLR, portion of the law was first applied in full in 2011. It limits spending on administrative costs, salaries and bonuses. Other portions of the law went into effect this year, including the creation of exchanges to sell insurance to individuals as well as the expansion of Medicaid.

[font size="3"]If insurance companies had maintained the 2011 ratio of premiums relative to the cost of medical care, consumers would have spent $3.8 billion more in additional premiums in 2013[/font], the health agency said.

but that is NOT the whole story. Let's not forget the premiums charged by insurance companies. The ACA has reduced the rate of increase of health care costs (the bending of the cost curve).

Affordable Care Act will produce savings for a family of four of ~$2500 by 2016
(all emphases my own)

Before he was criticized for his statements about insurance continuity, President Obama was lambasted for his forecasts of cost savings. In 2007, Obama asserted that his health-care reform plan would save $2,500 per family relative to the trends at the time. The criticism was harsh; I know because I helped the then-senator make this forecast. [font size="3" color="blue"]Yet events have shown him to be right. Between early 2009 and now, the Office of the Actuaries at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has lowered its forecast of medical spending in 2016 by 1 percentage point of GDP. In dollar terms, this is $2,500 for a family of four[/font].

NOte that if you convert the $2,500 for a family of four to an aggregate figure that's a savings of about $3 Trillion - or about 6.6% savings as a percent of the aggregate Health care cost figure.


But what were Republicans predicting for Health care costs with the ACA in place?

For some more perspective lets examine what Republicans have been saying about the affect of the ACA on Healthcare costs. Chris Conover (an "Adjunct Scholar" at American Enterprise Institute), writing not a year ago, in Forbes Magazine stated the Affordable Care act would ADD $7,450 to the Healthcare costs for a typical family of four.

Obamacare Will Increase Health Spending By $7,450 For A Typical Family of Four


I'm happy to go with the estimate of the Office of the Actuaries at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services - which is a savings - in 2016 - of $3 Trillion - or a 6.6% savings.