Just a Little Bit of Obamacare Schadenfreude

Still a lovely day here so far, sunny, breezy, 70, without any humidity, which is promised for later today.  Just a quick Obamacare Schadenfreude update:

The GOP was right... GOP’s Obamacare fears come true

Liberals wanted a national enrollment system under Obamacare.

They might just get it.

Right now, 36 states rely on HealthCare.gov, the federal exchange, to enroll people in health coverage. At least two more states are opting in next year, with a few others likely to follow. Only two states are trying to get out.

That’s precisely the opposite of the Affordable Care Act’s original intent: 50 exchanges run by 50 states.

But please remember what Nancy Pelosi really wanted, a single payer (federal government) take over of the entire health care system, one sixth of the nation's economy.

The federal option was supposed to be a limited and temporary fallback. But a shift to a bigger, more permanent Washington-controlled system is instead underway — without preparation, funding or even public discussion about what a national exchange covering millions of Americans means for the future of U.S. health care. It’s coming about because intransigent Republicans shunned state exchanges, and ambitious Democrats bungled them.

Republicans had warned all along that President Barack Obama’s health law would lead to greater Washington control. “This was all predictable,” said Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), a physician who sees growing federal control of the health system hurting patients. “Our friends on the other side didn’t listen.”

What's notable about all this is that the failed state exchanges are primarily blue states; Oregon, Hawaii, Maryland.  Is is possible they were deliberate failures to empower the federal option?

Oh, and I found this along the way:  Why Healthcare exchanges are like flea markets.

The flea market does a lot to draw customers in. It has a big billboard next to its highway exit, a food court, and even hires a live band on weekends.

The 14 state exchanges and Healthcare.gov are supposed to be like that for health insurance. It's even the same principle behind the New York Stock Exchange, says Economist Douglas Holtz-Eakin.
. . .
"You could look at health insurance and see the same thing: Do people want to sell their policies on there? Or is it growing in magnitude? Those are sort of standard metrics of success for marketplaces, and we should apply them to [the exchanges]," he says.

Eight million people showed up to buy insurance on the exchanges in the first six months. But will it be a good enough deal to bring them back? Will more insurers jump in? Holtz-Eakin says we don't know enough yet to conclude which state's exchanges are successful.

"I think we know the outliers, we know the big failures in Oregon and Maryland, for example. We know what appear to be the great successes in places like Kentucky, which is quite cheap and have a big fraction of people signed up. In between, it's pretty hard to make the case we know who's better than someone else," he says.
. . .
There's just not enough information right now for Economists like Holtz-Eakin pass judgment on the Affordable Care Act's marketplaces. He says they're only part of the picture of the federal health law's success anyway.

"I think the focus on the exchanges per se is a natural fallout from Healthcare.gov melting down at the beginning," he says, "but it's really not the right metric for success or failure."

Economist Jonathan Gruber agrees. "Success can really only be defined ultimately as a significant improvement in the well-being of the US public - un-insurance rates drop, seeing health improved, seeing bankruptcies drop."