The expansion would mean employers have an incentive to stop offering coverage.
The debate over renewing the expansion of ObamaCare subsidies has focused on the 6% of Americans enrolled. But if you get medical insurance through your employer, you should worry. If Congress extends the subsidies, you could end up losing your plan.
The Affordable Care Act of 2010 set the subsidies at the highest level that would avoid creating an incentive for employers to eliminate medical benefits. Employers purchase 89% of all privately funded health insurance in the U.S. The ACA aimed to help low-income working households that lacked an offer of job-based benefits. But the ACA’s reforms made policies unappealing to customers paying full price. Healthy Americans stopped buying plans, premiums more than doubled, and insurers hiked deductibles and stopped covering the best hospitals.
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Chris Pope is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.
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