Friday, October 30, 2009

The Arbitrary Government Price Controls Act

Sec. 104 of the House bill (on page 31) states:

The Secretary of Health and Human Services, in conjunction with the States, shall establish a process for the annual review of increases in premiums for health insurance coverage. Such process shall require health insurance issuers to submit a justification for any premium increases prior to implementation of the increase.

This is the entire section, it's kind of broad and vague isn't it? It doesn't mention anything about an appeals process for insurers or anything like that or what would be automatically be considered a justification for a premium increase. So one could envision a group of bureaucrats who accept almost no justification from payors. "MLR's at 95% or over 100%? We don't care. If you go bankrupt we just get that much closer to single payor". The insurer could sue but that would take years and it won't help them when they are bankrupt.

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