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Buy Your Health Insurance Out of State
Townhall.com ^ | November 19, 2014 | Jeff Jacoby

Posted on 11/20/2014 5:25:57 AM PST by Kaslin

The second open enrollment period for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act is underway, and the law is more unpopular than ever. According to Gallup, a record-high 56 percent of Americans now disapprove of the 2010 law.

on Friday the administration unveiled a new one: In large swaths of the country, the price of insurance sold on the federal health exchange is going up. That will force many of those who bought coverage last year to scramble to find a new policy or fork over as much as 20 percentin higher premiums. How's that "affordable" health care working out for you?

Republicans in Congress — less inclined than some deep thinkers to sneer at "the stupidity of the American people" — unanimously opposed the Affordable Care Act when it was enacted, and were rewarded in the 2010 midterms for their steadfastness. In the ensuing four years, Republicans repeatedly called for replacing Obamacare with alternatives expanding choice, competition, and market reforms — and the voters just rewarded them again.

Of course, even with their new majorities in Congress Republicans will have to contend with President Obama's veto pen. So a bill "repealing every last vestige of Obamacare," as Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky exuberantly proposed on Election Night, isn't in the cards anytime soon. But that doesn't mean there is nothing to be done, particularly since the Supreme Court has agreed to hear a new challenge to the law, one that could potentially cause Obamacare to topple under its own weight.

One way or another, changes in the law are coming. Not all of them have to be bitterly controversial, or provoke cries of Republican overreaching. Here's a suggestion: Allow individuals to buy health insurance from out of state.

In an age when consumers can purchase almost anything from vendors almost anywhere, government policies protecting insurance companies from interstate competition are indefensible. Lawmakers would be laughed out of office, rightly, if they insisted that the only CDs, cellphones, or ceramics their constituents could buy were those manufactured in the state where they lived. All sorts of financial products are routinely acquired without to state borders proving an impenetrable barrier: life insurance, service warranties, stocks and bonds, bank accounts, credit cards. Why should a medical plan be any different?

There is no good reason to deny freedom of choice to Americans when it comes to buying health insurance. Yet licensing rules in virtually every state effectively prevent individual residents from shopping for health plans in any other state. Consequently, there is no national market for health insurance. There are only autonomous state markets, many dominated by near-monopolies that can get away with offering lower quality insurance at ever-higher premiums.

As Michael Cannon of the Cato Institute points out, it isn't only insurance companies that are sheltered from the rigors of competition. Insurance regulators are insulated too. State governments, inveigled by special interests, can burden health insurance policies with more and more mandatory benefits, driving up premiums to cover services that many consumers would never willingly choose.

In Massachusetts, for instance, health insurance policies must cover at least 49 specifiedtreatments and types of providers, among them midwives, infertility treatments, hair prostheses, and chiropractors. But what if all you want is a plain-vanilla health plan akin to those sold by insurers in New Hampshire (only 38 state-required health-care mandates) or, better yet, in Michigan (24) or Idaho (13)? Tough luck. That's what it means when interstate commerce in health insurance is blocked.

Polls show broad public support for the idea — as high as 77 percent in a recent Rasmussen poll.Legislation to overhaul the Affordable Care Act, currently being drafted by Florida Senator Marco Rubio and Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan, will reportedly include interstate choice. "We want … every American to be able to buy the kind of health insurance they want at a price that they are willing to buy and from any company in America that will sell it to you," Rubio said in a recent radio interview.

Which isn't to say change can only come from above. One can envision a moderate, pro-reform governor championing such market choice at the state level — a just-elected Republican, say, with a deep knowledge of the health insurance industry. How about it, Charlie Baker? Why not use that new bully pulpit to advocate for legislation freeing Massachusetts residents to buy a health policy from any properly licensed insurance company in America willing to sell it to them?

It's a fix long overdue. With the distortions imposed first by RomneyCare and then ObamaCare, Massachusetts could use it more than ever. The rest of the country could too. 


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Government
KEYWORDS: 0bamacare; healthcarecosts; stateexchanges

1 posted on 11/20/2014 5:25:57 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

Bump!


2 posted on 11/20/2014 5:37:57 AM PST by 4Liberty (Prejudice and generalizations. That's how Collectivists roll......)
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To: Kaslin

This has been suggested as a partial solution to the high cost of health care for a long time. More competition. The democrat controlled congress shot down every republican proposal for healthcare reform and I believe this was one of them.


3 posted on 11/20/2014 5:48:41 AM PST by smokingfrog ( sleep with one eye open (<o> ---)
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To: smokingfrog

Yes...problem now is all the mandatory coverage...ie birth control for seniors...getting govt out of healthcare (and myriad of other things too) is what’s needed.


4 posted on 11/20/2014 5:53:14 AM PST by goodnesswins (R.I.P. Doherty, Smith, Stevens, Woods)
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To: smokingfrog
The end result of this will be less competition as a few very large insurance companies gobble up the entire insurance market, i.e. what is happening with banks.

Also, this will put a nail in the coffin of efforts to oppose gay "marriage". Insurance companies selling policies in multiple states will push against any laws that make distinctions about which people are considered married, especially if their customers move from a pro-gay-marriage state to a pro-traditional-marriage state or vice-versa.

Finally, what does this say about states' rights? Is this really the feds getting in the way of the free market or will this really be about the feds dictating what the market will allow in each and every state regardless of the desires of the individual states?

Health insurance is not like cell phones. Health insurance directly impacts on people and their values. If it's true now that your particular state requires all insurance companies to pay for sex reassignment surgery and you think that "opening up" the insurance market will allow you to buy a cheaper policy that doesn't require such nonsense, well then think again. What is more likely to happen is that over time all policies throughout the country will be required to support such nonsense causing all policies to rise in price.

5 posted on 11/20/2014 6:21:58 AM PST by who_would_fardels_bear
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To: smokingfrog

There’s a four point plan for healthcare reform that has been already proven to work in Texas, and could be easily “allowed” throughout the USA.

*Individual tax deductible premiums.
*High balance, tax deductible HSAs, perpetual and inheritable.
*Tort reform.
*Interstate purchase of plans.

Now, the “problem” with these points is that it obviously favors those who actually work and pay taxes,
and is not a redistribution plan, which is the primary goal of Obamacare.


6 posted on 11/20/2014 6:26:18 AM PST by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: Kaslin

You could also solve this problem by not allowing governments to dictate what is covered in plans.

I.e.-

What we had before: states dictate different sets of coverage.

CommieCare solution: Fed dictates coverage so state doesn’t matter.

Free Market solution: don’t dictate coverage.


7 posted on 11/20/2014 6:45:25 AM PST by fruser1
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To: Kaslin

Hey, a real, actual use of the Commerce Power!


8 posted on 11/20/2014 7:15:04 AM PST by Svartalfiar
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To: Kaslin

Great article.

But let’s remember, you couldn’t buy health insurance from outside your State before Obamacare. The State legislators and insurance boards created and maintained health insurance monopolies then and that practice continues under Obamacare.

It is even worse under Obamacare. In many cases your choice of insurance companies is limited by the COUNTY you live in. You don’t even have access to other insurance sold in your own State on the ‘exchanges’

Obamacare was about creating new monopolies and strengthening old ones all throughout our healthcare system.

The whole thing stinks from top to bottom but let’s not pretend that some of these features were not there before. The worst of them have been retained and strengthened under Obamacare.

We need REAL reform.


9 posted on 11/20/2014 7:17:22 AM PST by Lorianne (fed pork, bailouts, gone taxmoney)
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To: Kaslin
In Massachusetts, for instance, health insurance policies must cover at least 49 specifiedtreatments and types of providers, among them midwives, infertility treatments, hair prostheses, and chiropractors. But what if all you want is a plain-vanilla health plan akin to those sold by insurers in New Hampshire (only 38 state-required health-care mandates) or, better yet, in Michigan (24) or Idaho (13)?

It would be interesting to see just what the cost of a health care policy with similar deductables would cost in each of these states and find out just what the savings are.

10 posted on 11/20/2014 7:27:52 AM PST by DoodleDawg
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To: MrB

There is a much better way by removing FRAUD:
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229605

KD has written many articles detailing what is wrong and how to fix it. I suggest everyone check it out. This is his latest.


11 posted on 11/20/2014 8:38:40 AM PST by eyeamok
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To: Kaslin

“In Massachusetts, for instance, health insurance policies must cover ... infertility treatments...”

In CA, they cover infertility treatments for gay couples.


12 posted on 11/20/2014 1:13:03 PM PST by Rusty0604
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