Still on Hiatus

Hello. Just wanted to let you know this blog will be reactived soon — I’m aiming for the first of July. After over two years, roughly 450 posts, and the long health care reform debate, it was time to take a short break. My thanks for the kind notes and inquiries and I look forward to resuming the dialogue in a few weeks.
Thanks,
Alan

Does Utah Show the Future of Broker Commissions?

With carrier scurrying around trying to figure out how they’ll meet the Medical Loss Ratio (“MLR”) requirements in the new health care reform, brokers are, not surprisingly, wondering what the impact will be on their commissions. Under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, carriers in the individual and small group markets (small groups are considered to be businesses with up to 100 employees) must spend 80 percent of the premiums they collect on claims and health care quality expenses. (The MLR target is 85 percent for larger group policies). Since selling costs are considered administrative costs, producers are quite naturally concerned about what the impact of the MLR requirement will be on their incomes.

In a previous post, I walked through the math defining the future of commissions in the individual market. To expand on the calculations presented there:

1. Mature, large carriers need roughly 7-to-8 percent of premium to cover their administrative costs
2. Carriers look for profits of about 4-to-5 percent of premium (non-profits categorize this as “retained earnings”)
3. Carriers must spend 80 percent of premium on claims and health care quality expenses or return to premium payers the difference.
4. What’s left for broker commissions? Let’s call it 8 percent. Carriers can pay more than that the first year (to help compensate brokers for their acquisition costs) and less on renewals or they can pay a flat commission. But over the life of the policy carriers can afford to spend roughly 8 percent of premium on broker compensation costs.

Today, premiums are tied to the premiums paid by the client. Those premiums are increasing at a rate far exceeding general inflation due to skyrocketing medical costs driving up insurance premiums.  Given the pressure to reduce costs, this structure is going to change. In the individual market, carriers will likely tie broker compensation to either the premium in-force at the time of the sale or a flat fee per subscriber or member. Smarter carriers will include cost of living increases in their compensation arrangements. Otherwise the compensation will, over time, become increasingly less competitive. In the small group market tying commission to the original premium is a bit more problematic as employees come and go over time. (While the pressure to mess with broker commissions is far less in the small business market segment than it is for individual plans, eventually those carriers will need and/or want to tie commissions to something other than medical inflation).

A flat per subscriber or member fee is in many ways easier for everyone to understand. However, not every carrier’s commission systems can make these calculations so some health plans will use the initial premium. The question is, can these commission schedules be designed in a way that fairly compensates brokers for the work they do? The answer depends, of course, on what level the per capita fee is set and whether it is limited to one initial payment or continues while the client is insured by the carrier.

State regulators of exchanges will have a large say in broker commissions. They could let the market decide producer fees or simply impose commission schedules. Even if they take the latter approach, all is not doom and gloom for brokers. Enlightened regulators recognize the value brokers add to the system and have demonstrated a willingness to fairly compensate producers. Less informed regulators seem to come up with arbitrary levels that completely ignore the ongoing work brokers do for their clients — and the carriers they represent. As the number of insureds dramatically increase those states that underestimate brokers’ contributions — and underpay them — will see brokers migrate to non-medical products, leaving state bureaucrats to deal with millions of (rightfully) demanding and impatient consumers.

Of course, there will be markets outside the state exchanges. So carriers will also be making producer compensation decisions, too. These carriers can offer exchange regulators a benchmark when it comes to establishing commissions within the state-run marketplaces.

Utah already has a health insurance exchange. What they’ve done with broker compensation is instructive. According to Health Plan Week, the Utah exchange is relatively new and bugs are still being worked out. The exchange has had difficulty pricing their offerings competitively, resulting in only a handful of employers enrolling.  But changes to the Utah law are underway and membership is expected to increase dramatically.

As reported by Health Plan Week, the Utah exchange today pays brokers $37 per employee per month. This is a level that most brokers will find acceptable. And the simplicity of the Utah exchange model, compared to the Connector established in Massachusetts, may make it an attractive model for other states to emulate.

The Massachusetts Connector) has had problems of its own, but insures far more consumers. First, that exchange is targeted at individuals, not small groups as the Utah exchange is. They also pay about 75 percent less than the Utah exchange, a level that many producers will find makes selling and servicing medical insurance unprofitable.

The state exchanges will arrive on the scene in 2014 — plenty of time for brokers to educate regulators about their value and work toward reasonable and responsible compensation formulas. On the other hand, the MLR requirements take effect in 2011. Consequently, carriers must announce their new compensation schedules in the next few months — and certainly no later than the end of October (Halloween, how appropriate). What carriers do concerning broker compensation, and how they go about doing it, will have a significant impact on how exchanges pay producers.

Change is coming. But as Utah demonstrates, change doesn’t have to be fatal.

More Health Care Reform Catch-up

Yesterday I began the process of catching up with various odds-and-ends related to health care reform. Here’s some more items worth noting.

1. One of the items in the previous post considered whether the phrase “Medical Loss Ratio” is appropriate. Paying claims is, after all, the purpose of health insurance. So maybe such spending should be renamed “Wellness Investments.” But whether you call it Medical Loss Ratio or Wellness Investment (as the Venture, the fact is the MLR requirement contained in the new health care reform law is going to impact the way carriers and brokers do business. The Wall Street Journal notes that “the first to feel the effects of the nation’s health care system overhaul are insurance salespeople.” (A subscription is required to read the entire article). The gist of their point is that with only 20% of premium dollars to spend on all administrative costs, profits and commissions, today’s commission schedules in the individual and small group markets simply aren’t sustainable. My take is that a lot will depend on what state one works in. The differences in commission schedules from state-to-state are quite striking. In California it’s not uncommon for brokers to receive 20% of the first year commission on an individual sale. In states such as Texas and Georgia I’ve heard first year commissions top out at 10%. The transition to post-health care reform commissions in Texas and Georgia will be a lot less painful than in California. Whatever carriers are going to do about commissions they’ll have to announce sooner than later. The Medical Loss Ratio provisions of the new health care reform law take effect in 2011. So commission changes will need to be announced sometime in the Fall.
2. As I’ve written before, I don’t think commissions are going away. And in the small group market, where commission levels are lower than for individual sales, the need for major change to compensation schedules is relatively less critical. What will change, in both the individual and small group markets, is tying broker compensation to medical cost trends, which is what happens when renewals are linked to the then current premium paid by the group). Instead, carriers are likely to experiment broker compensation based on a flat fee per subscriber and/or dependent or tie the commission to the premium in-force at the time of the original sale (either of these formulas should be, and probably will be, subject to cost-of-living adjustments). Neither approach will be comfortable for brokers. During a webinar I participated in for Norvax, a poll of the 400+ brokers was taken: two-thirds supported keeping commission structures as is. Understandable, but not likely.
3. Brokers aren’t the only ones having to deal with new financial realities. The Motley Fool financial site shows the hit pharmaceutical companies will take as a result of the reforms. The amounts are large (for most drug companies $200-$400 million in 2010) although as a percentage of their 2009 revenue they seem slightly less severe (from 1.6%-to-5.6%). Not that this is an insignificant hit to a company’s bottom line, but it’s hard to feel too bad for these enterprises given the high prices Americans pay for the same pills sold for far less elsewhere.
4. A few weeks ago I ran a poll asking readers to predict whether health care reform would move consumers from small group to individual medical coverage, move them from individual to small group health plans or have no effect on either market. Over 100 readers took the time to respond and there’s a definite consensus: 69% predict health care reform will move consumers who currently are covered by their employers into the individual market. Only 17% expect the new law to have no effect, and 14% see the legislation to spark a migration from individual to small group coverage.
5. Reader Malcom Cutler posted an interesting question the other day about how the small business tax credit the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“PPACA”) impacts the deductibility of premiums paid by small businesses. My thanks to reader Michael B who found the answer. Michael noted that in the IRS guidelines concerning the health insurance premium tax credit, it states that “ In determining the employer’s deduction for health insurance premiums, the amount of premiums that can be deducted is reduced by the amount of the credit.”  The IRS recently mailed out over four million postcards to small businesses about the health insurance tax credits. Brokers — and others — will want to stay up-to-date with the resources available to answer the inevitable questions coming their way. (For those interested, here’s a copy of the postcard).
6. Of course, the tax credit goes away if the health care reform package were to be repealed. The chances of that are slim. It will take a two-thirds vote of both chambers of  Congress to repeal health care reform while President Barack Obama occupies the White House. And even if a Republican were to take his place in 2013, 60 votes would be needed in the Senate to overcome a filibuster. In other words, repeal is unlikely. But it is, apparently, popular. According to a recent poll by Rasmussen Reports, 56 percent of respondents favored repealing the new health care reform law, while 39 percent opposed repeal. This percentage has been fairly consistent since passage of the bill. Of course, when people agree with the polls, they argue Congress should listen to the will of the people; when they don’t like the survey results they tend to praise those who stand on principle instead of basing their positions on, well, polls. So what one thinks Congress should do about this poll results depends a great deal on where you stand on the reform package. The reality, as noted above, however, is that the law is unlikely to be repealed. The reform legislation will evolve, even as it is implemented, but change is coming. The key is to prepare for it.
7. Preparing for reform is what the California Medical Association is doing. You may remember an earlier post on this blog about the CMA’s efforts to elect the former chair of its legislative committee to the California legislature. The theory is sound: there’s no better place to have a lobbyist than sitting inside the majority caucus. Especially with so many health care reform issues required to be made at the state level.  How much does it cost to buy an assembly seat?  The CMA and its allies have poured more than $200,000 into the race — including an independent expenditure committee set up by the CMA with an initial investment of $106,000 and not counting at least three “off-the-campaign book mailings. This investment is necessary because the CMA’s candidate, Richard Pan has been singularly unsuccessful in raising much in the way of campaign dollars from within the district. Obviously the CMA doesn’t care about the interests of the residents of the Fifth Assembly District. The job of the CMA is to look out for the financial interests of their members. And they’re certainly doing that. For all their dollars, however, the CMA is having trouble with their acquisition plans. They spent plenty trying to buy the official Democratic Party endorsement, but were blocked by supporters of a community-based candidate for the seat, Larry Miles. Their spending did, however, garner support from most of the Capitol establishment. But Mr. Miles is running a strong, grass-roots campaign and, from all accounts I’ve heard, the race remains extremely close. (By the way, I’ve known Larry since we were roommates in college — many, many years ago. Not surprisingly, then, I’ve contributed to his campaign. If you want to help Larry stand up to the CMA, or are simply interested in helping elect a qualified, thoughtful leader to the California legislature, I encourage you to  do the same).

 Well, that’s enough catching up for now. Please leave a comment with your observations of some of the more interesting health care reform related developments of the past few weeks. Thanks.

Catching Up With Health Care Reform

I’ve taken a few weeks off from blogging, but health care reform sure hasn’t taken a break. There’s a lot going on, so let’s catch up with some interesting tidbits:

1. In April the Internal Revenue Service issued guidelines concerning one of the more popular provisions of the new health care reform bill: the tax credit some small employers may use to offset the cost of their health insurance premiums. The credit is available to qualifying group of less than 25 employees, and there’s a cap: the average premium paid for coverage in the business’ state. In other words, the amount of premium paid above these average premiums is not eligible for the credit. The list of average premiums (published by the IRS, but created by the Department of Health and Human Services) is interesting in its own right. For example, employee-only coverage ranges from a low of $4,215 in Idaho to a high of $6,205 in Alaska. (In California, where I hang out, it’s $4,628). Idaho again has the lowest premium for family coverage $9,365), with Massachusetts having the highest family premium ($14,138).
2. In addition to the original IRS guidelines, the Obama Administration has released additional guidance to the small business tax credit created in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“PPACA”). There’s some welcome news in the material: dental and vision coverage are eligible for the credit; employers can choose the method of determining hours worked by their employees in whatever way maximizes the tax credit; and the federal credit is in addition to any state health care tax credits or subsidies available to an employer. This document also lists other benefits health care reform delivers to small businesses: the ability to pool together in exchanges; elimination of pre-existing conditions, elimination of the “hidden tax” employers with coverage currently pay (see #5, below) of roughly $1,000 per policy.
3. You might think all this would be music to ears of small businesses. If so, it’s not enough to satisfy the National Federation of Independent Businesses. The NFIB has signed onto the law suit filed by 20 state attorneys general and governors challenging the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The key argument of the suit is that the federal government has no power to regulate whether an individual to enter into an intrastate contract. According to the Associated Press article reporting the NFIB’s support of the suit, the government will argue that “a decision to opt out of health insurance is not merely a matter of personal choice. It has consequences for others, since uninsured people will get sick, or have accidents, and someone must pay for their care if they can’t afford it.  Individual decisions to forgo insurance coverage, in the aggregate, substantially affect interstate commerce by shifting costs to health care providers and the public.” Welcome to a gray area of constitutional law. Feel free to argue one side or the other all you want, but there are responsible arguments on both sides. And they’ll be argued before many courts over the next three or four years.
4. Much of the health care reform debate focused on the pricing practices of health insurance carriers. Now focus is moving towards the pricing practices of medical providers. In Massachusetts, for example, the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating whether one of the state’s hospitals are guilty of violating antitrust laws. According to an editorial in the Boston Globe, the DOJ the inquiry was launched after it was shown that some hospitals are demanding “rates much higher than others … for identical procedures.”  Meanwhile, the same editorial cites a report by Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley that showed that hospitals with “geographic monopolies” use their market clout to push rates up “and contributes to annual increases in insurance premiums that greatly exceed the cost-of-living index.” Nice of someone to notice, isn’t it?
5. There tends to be a lot of two-sided coins when it comes to health care reform. Take the term “Medical Loss Ratio.” This refers to the percentage of premium dollars spent on medical care and health quality by health plans. The Venture Cyclist blog asked an interesting question, “Why do they call it Medical Loss Ratio? Why is looking after me (or you) called ‘Medical Loss’, when the whole point of a health care system is to look after me (or you)?” He’s got a point. Calling this expense “Wellness Investment” (as the Venture Cyclist suggests), would be as accurate. He goes further, suggesting that what’s not spent on looking after the health of premium payers be termed an “Administrative Loss Ratio.” It reminds me of when folks started referring to cost-shifting (which is the increased cost insured consumers pay to cover expenses incurred by their non-insured neighbors) a “hidden tax.” Words do matter.

Well, that’s enough catch-up for now, but there’s more to come.

Health Care Reform: The Individual-Small Group Seesaw

One of the most frequent questions I’m asked about health care reform is whether the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will result drive people from group plans to individual plans or vice versa. It’s an interesting question. We have enough information to make some guesses, but not enough to know. And there are reasonable scenarios that can be created for each conclusion.

An individual coverage scenario: No small business owner I’ve met got into business for the thrill of buying health insurance for the company.  Now health care reform makes it easy for them to get out of the insuring business: give every worker a small raise along with the URL for the state health insurance exchange. The employees benefit: they get to choose their own health plan and some may qualify for premium subsidies. Their coverage isn’t tied to their employment and they can keep their plan if they change jobs. They don’t even need to spend all of their raise on premiums nor are they locked into the exchange. Once the employer decides not to provide coverage they can obtain individual coverage where they please.

Employers benefit from no longer having to shop for health insurance for their workers (they’ll have to shop for their own families, but that’s a lot less stressful). No more complaints. No more  bookkeeping.

A small group coverage scenario: Small business owners aren’t required to purchase coverage today, but there are good reasons for their doing so — and those reasons aren’t changed by health care reform. Providing health insurance helps small businesses recruit and retain good employees. Employers’ contributions to health insurance premiums makes coverage more affordable for employees. Yes, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act provides subsidies to some workers, but only those earning less than 400 percent of the federal poverty level ($43,320 for an individual and $88,200 for a family of four in 2010).  So, depending on their salary, sending employees to the individual market will be perceived as a loss to some employees.

Even if employees receive a small raise to help them with buying their own coverage, employees may see the loss of work-based coverage. How long before that raise is considered just part of their salary? A month? A quarter? The connection between the raise and the coverage is tenuous and easily forgotten. Look at it from an employee’s point of view who …

• Receives a raise and buys own coverage: my boss gave me a $200 raise. Coverage costs $250. Wow that’s a lot. Of course, after the raise it’s a net expense of $50, but still — $250 a month for insurance is a lot of money.
• Has employer-provided coverage: My share of the health insurance premium is just $50. My neighbor pays $250. I’ve got a good deal.

Which way?

There’s a lot of other factors that will impact the movement of consumers between individual and small group plans. Employers may cover the cost of Bronze benefit plans and allow each employee to buy-up to a Silver or Gold offering. Companies could drop — or add — ancillary products like dental, life, long term care or disability coverage. The exchange could be easier to use than is anticipated today — or much harder.

Predicting whether health care reform will shift consumers from small group to individual or move them the other way is simply guesswork at this point. My advice to brokers who ask what they should do to prepare for this seesaw ride is to get engaged in both market segments. Brokers active in both the individual and small group markets will have plenty of customers regardless of which direction the teeter totters. I also suggest they become expert on assorted other benefit plans (voluntary benefits, group dental, life, long term care and disability). That way they’ll have additional opportunities to meet clients’ needs. Success under health care reform will go to the nimble and flexible.

What’s your guess? (Please vote only once)

Health Care Reform Odds and Ends

Depending on your perspective – and stress level – every morsel of information about health care reform is either big news or not. But regardless of whether you perceive the information beginning to emerge as substantial or just more hints about what is to come, the good news is the information is coming. This post presents some odds and ends concerning health care reform along with some interesting resources readers may want to know about.

1. USA Today has a short (surprise, surprise) article on upcoming key dates concerning health care reform.
2. Publicly traded companies are required to disclose about possible risks to their future earnings and performance. When a number of large enterprises began reporting that health care reform would hurt their earnings, however, some lawmakers were, as the New York Times put it “skeptical.” Now that they’ve investigated the matter, however, the Times is reporting that “House Democrats have concluded that the companies were right to tell investors and the government about the expected adverse effects of the law on their financial results.”
3. Health care reform will not lower the cost of health insurance for most Americans. In fact, given the taxes imposed on medical suppliers and carriers, restrictions on health plans ability to manage risk, the incentives for some healthy individuals to go without coverage until they need it, and a host of other provisions in the bill, it is inevitable that health insurance premiums are headed up – steeply and soon. Politicians will no doubt pound on carriers for this result, but serious lawmakers realize that the only way to restrain the cost of medical insurance is to restrain the cost of medical care. The New Hampshire legislature is showing signs of dealing with this reality. Bloomberg recently reported lawmakers in the Granite State are considering establishing a board to review hospital costs.
4. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ Office of the Actuary released their analysis on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The independent review is given great weight. Not surprisingly, however, what someone takes away from the report seems to reflect more about that someone than the data in the report. Just check out some of the comments about the CMS report gathered by the Kaiser Health News site. Given that no law delivers on all its promises, or on what critics fear it will bring, an objective view of the bill can’t help but provide ammunition to both sides. And the CMS report does just that.
5. For those who need to atone for past sins, you can do penance by reading the two bills now known as health care reform.
6. One group who will need to read the bill are insurance commissioners. They have substantial responsibilities for interpreting and refining the law. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners web site has a thorough library of information about the new reforms. It’s a great resource on various aspects of the reforms.
7. One of the best resources around concerning health care reform is provided by the National Association of Health Underwriters to its members. If you’re a broker and not a member of Health Underwriters, you’re doing your profession a disservice. And you’re unable to get to NAHU’s resource page. Which is a shame because its definitely worth the price of admission.

There’s a lot more odds and ends out there. I’ll cover more in future posts. Hopefully, however, this is an interesting start.

Health Care Reform: (No Doubt Inaccurate) Predictions

I’ve tried not to make too many predictions about the impact of health care reform. Not that readers – especially brokers – aren’t concerned about what the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will have on how and where people obtain health insurance coverage. I get questions all the time about whether employers will tend to drop coverage and send millions of consumers to the exchange or into the individual market? Or will Americans who currently purchase their own health insurance find new coverage opportunities in the group market? How big are the exchanges likely to get?

For brokers there’s an additional layer of concern: what’s likely to happen to commissions and will the migration of consumers from one market segment to another offset expected changes (i.e., reductions) to compensation?

The questions are appropriate – and numerous – but my hesitancy in offering answers is because no one really knows. Lots of people are willing to make lots of predictions. But the truth is reality has a way of throwing its weight around in unanticipated ways. We’re talking about a lot of regulations, court cases, and proposed amendments still to come. And since many of the provisions that will determine consumer choices don’t take effect until 2014, even educated guesses are more guess than educated.

But you’ve asked for tea leaves, so here’s some tea leaves. But be forewarned, predictions can cause more stress than insight. And if they’re wrong (as they’re likely to be) why worry about them? So the sane among you will stop reading now. For everyone else, just two requests: 1) don’t shoot the messenger; and 2) assume I’m wrong. With those ground rules, please feel free to read on.

Impact of Reform on Market Segment

Of all the folks making projections on how folks are likely to move between group and individual coverage and the exchanges, the Congressional Budget Office is probably one source with credible insight. Not just because their projections are what Congress relied upon in passing health care reform, but because they’ve spent considerable time and resources trying to model this out.

What’s well known is that the CBO estimated 32 million otherwise uninsured non-elderly Americans would obtain coverage under the original Senate health care reform bill and the clean-up legislation (HR 3590 and HR 4872, for those keeping score at home). What’s less well known is that the letter (on page 21) also estimated where non-elderly consumers would obtain their coverage (non-elderly is the focus because those age 65 are eligible for Medicare).

Unfortunately, the CBO didn’t break-out coverage between large and small employers, but their projections are interesting nonetheless.

In 2010, the CBO estimates 150 million non-elderly Americans have employer sponsored health insurance, 27 million have non-group coverage (which includes Medicare – the CBO estimates roughly half of this category are in the individual market, which tracks with the estimates I’ve seen that approximately 17 million Americans buy their own coverage), and 50 million are uninsured.

Without the health care reform bill, the CBO projected that by 2015 the group market would have grown to 162 million non-elderly Americans, the non-group market segment would grow to 29 million and the number of uninsured to 51 million.

With the reforms, however, the CBO is estimating that the number of Americans with group coverage in 2015 will be 163 million (an additional one million people), those with non-group coverage will number 26 million (three million less than without reform and one million less than today), 13 million Americans will obtain coverage through the Exchange and the number of uninsured will have fall to 26 million.

The important figure here is the loss of one million consumers buying non-group plans. Given that roughly one-half of these are in Medicare, that’s a loss of approximately 500,000 people in the individual market segment. If there are 17 million in today’s market, that’s a drop of about three percent.

Then there’s the eight million the CBO estimates will be in the exchanges. This population is around half of today’s individual market. To put this in context important to producers: if brokers are fairly compensated for helping even 10 percent of these enroll in the exchange they will have more than made up for shrinkage in the individual market projected by the CBO. If brokers are engaged in just 50 percent of these enrollments they will have increased their customer base over today’s number by over 20 percent

Commissions: The New Math

Commissions on individual coverage today vary considerably from state-to-state. As a result, changes to commissions resulting from health care reform are likely to be far more noticeable in high-commission states (think California) than lower commission states (for example, Texas). But the math remains the same. Here’s how I see the calculations working out. These assume that disease management, nursing call centers and the like are considered health related and not as administrative costs. It also assumes taxes and fees are taken out of the equation.

1. Mature, large carriers are likely to need to spend approximately 7-to-8 percent of premium for administration their individual plans.
2. Carriers need to achieve at least 4-to-5 percent of premium for profit (or for retained earnings for non-profits) from this market segment.
3. Given that individual carriers must spend 80 percent of premium on claims and other activities that improve health care quality, that leaves roughly 8 percent for distribution costs.

Some other considerations: the days of tying broker compensation to medical inflation are likely coming to an end – and this is what happens when commissions are calculated as a percentage of the client’s current premium) are probably over. Instead, distribution compensation will likely be based on a per contract, per member or original premium basis.

If carriers use the same math I do, commissions in this range will be a modest change in some states. In others, this math leads to a far more dramatic result. Of course, the math, like most predictions you’ll hear today, is probably wrong.

Medical Loss Ratios Will Be First Indication of Health Care Reform’s Real Impact

 The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requires carriers to spend specified percentages of the premium dollars they take in on paying claims and other activities that improve health care quality. This Medical Loss Ratio (“MLR”) requirement will have far-reaching effects on health care coverage, carrier costs and broker compensation. So the details concerning how it will be implemented is of critical importance.

For example, when dealing with any percentage there’s a numerator (the amount a health plan spends on claims and health quality improvements) and the denominator (the amount of premiums it takes in). Seems simple enough – until you get into the specifics.

The law says money spent on taxes (federal and state), licensing and regulatory fees are excluded from the calculation altogether. And it takes into account dollars spent on risk adjustments and reinsurance. The federal MLR targets are 85 percent for larger groups (100 employees or more) and 80 percent for individual and small group coverage. States can impose higher Medical Loss Ratio targets, but the Secretary of Health and Human Services can lower the targets if doing so is necessary to stabilize the individual market in a state.

If health plans spend less than the required percentage on claims and health care quality expenses, the underpayment must be returned in the form of rebates to its enrollees.

That’s pretty much what the law provides for. As I’ve mentioned before, however, the law is just a framework; the actions of judges, regulators and those living under the law are what brings it to life. It’s what happens after the law is passed that fills in the details.

Three federal Departments, working with the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, are tasked with filling in a lot of the details concerning. To help draft the devil’s new home — the details — the three Departments have requested input from the public concerning Medical Loss Ratios. (For those interested, you can submit comments online within 30 days from when the request was published in the Federal Register on April 14th).

What’s interesting is the questions they ask. (In the hard copy of the Departments’ Request for Comments relating to Medical Loss Ratios they start on page 13). Some of it is purely informational: what data is currently collected concerning MLR calculations at the state level? Some, however, go directly to the issue of whether this provision will result in a vibrant private market for health insurance or not. For instance, on page 17 of the hard copy the request seeks information on the impact of aggregating data “at the policy form level, by plan type, by line of business, by company, by State.”

Think about that for a moment and compare two scenarios In the first, each specific small group product a carrier offers has to individually meet the MLR requirement and do so each year. In the second scenario, all of a carriers’ small group products offered in a state have to meet or exceed the Medical Loss Ratio targets in the aggregate.

The first scenario leaves little room for error, meaning pricing and plan design will be extremely conservative. No innovation welcome. Actuaries and the health plan executives who love them will stick to the tried and true. The second scenario, however, will allow for some flexibility. New products can be offered with the knowledge that its impact will be minor in the MLR calculations relative to the carriers’ existing block of business. The result will be the continued introduction of new product designs and increased consumer choice.

The Departments are also looking at whether carriers should be allowed to aggregate their Medical Loss Ratio at the state or national level, how the data will be reported (the law requires each carriers’ MLR to be posted on the Internet), whether new carriers and regional health plans should be treated differently than national carriers. In addition to their stated questions, commentators can provide information and perspective on any issue related to the MLR issue.

The task of defining the rules, regulations, and definitions concerning Medical Loss Ratios will not be an easy one, especially given the need for speed. For most carriers, the MLR requirements will be based on the premiums they take in and spending they incur starting January 1, 2011 — less than eight months away. By law the regulations have to be in place by December 31, 2010. As a practical matter, however, to be implemented in 2011, health plans need to have their new business models in place by early Fall at the latest. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is aware of these realities. She asked for input from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners by June 1st so the regulations can be published as soon as possible.

As I’ve written previously, the impact of health care reform will be revealed over time. The MLR regulations will be the first indication of where reform is headed. They will tell us a great deal about the viability of private coverage, the role brokers will play under a reformed health care system, and whether consumers will find much choice in the health insurance marketplace. These are not just details, but important details.

When It Comes To Health Care Reform, Nothing Is Easy

One of the most welcome elements of the health care reform package signed into law by President Barack Obama concerns the creation of high risk pools. For Americans with pre-existing condition who are unable to obtain insurance from the private sector and do not qualify for government programs like Medicaid, these pools are their only source for health insurance coverage.

According to an article by Sean Carr for A.M. Best Company, in 2009 35 states offered high risk pools enrolling roughly 200,000 people. To qualify for these pools, applicants have to first be rejected by commercial carriers on medical grounds. The coverage is more expensive than in the private market (not surprising since, by definition, the pool is made up of individuals with much higher than average usage and claims) and the benefits are leaner than generally available (to help keep the programs affordable). The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act set aside $5 billion to establish new ones in states currently without them and to supplement existing programs. This aspect of health care reform is to take effect July 1st.

A safety net for those unable to get traditional coverage providing a bridge until exchanges are established in 2014. Whether you approve of the overall health care reform bill or not, this might seem like a good deal for $5 billion.

Well, not necessarily. For example, if you’re running for high office high risk pools can be an opportunity to score political points. And if you’re one of those 200,000 consumers already enrolled in a high risk pool, you might feel as if you’ve entered the Twilight Zone. And what if $5 billion isn’t enough?

There’s an underlying assumption, but not a requirement, that it would be state governments which establish these new high risk pools. But state governments are political beasts, so nothing is ever simple. So perhaps it’s not surprising that, as Mr. Carr reports, Georgia Insurance Commissioner and candidate for Governor, John Oxendine, has announced his state will not participate in the program in a letter, dated April 12th, to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

Most “business mail” between government officials are boring, straight-to-the-point, well, business letters. This one is different. Commissioner Oxendine’s letter begins “I am in receipt of your April 2, 2010 letter detailing the first step in the recently enacted federal takeover of the United States health care system.” Not your typical opening for a formal inter-governmental missive. The letter then goes on to attack the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as a hastily drafted “government takeover of 17 percent of the United States economy, for being unconstitutional, and for eventually imposing an additional $1 billion burden on Georgia for Medicaid spending.

Commissioner Oxendine then questions whether the high risk pools, which are supposed to go away when carriers are obliged to accept all applicants regardless of their existing medical conditions will really be a temporary program. Consequently, he writes, “I cannot commit the State of Georgia to implement a federal high risk pool program that is part of a broader insurance scheme which I believe the Supreme Court will hold to be unconstitutional, leads to the further expansion of the federal government, undermines the financial security of our nation, and potentially commits the state of Georgia to future financial obligations.” He then ends his political attack on the health care reform plan Secretary Sebelius worked hard to enact as only politicians can: “With kindest personal regards ….”

My point for going into all this is not to comment on the merits of Commissioner Oxendine’s position (some of his arguments are overblown; some legitimate). Rather the letter strikes me as evidence that implementing health care reform – even the so-called “easy parts” – is going to be an extremely rocky road.

Keep in mind, Commissioner Oxendine’s letter does not mean Georgians in need will be denied access to a high risk pool. As Mr. Sean reports, the law allows HHS to contract with a qualified non-profit entity to run the pool if the state declines to do so. In this regard, Commissioner Oxendine is playing the equivalent of a candidate’s free card. He gets to use his state office to attack the federal government and the Administration’s health care reform plan without doing anything more than inconveniencing that federal government and some of his state’s citizens. What’s not to like?

Then there’s the coming Twilight Zone episode: Those enrolled in state high risk pools will be ineligible to participate in the new federally-funded program even though the coverage will be better than what they currently receive and less expensive than what they currently pay.

The reason, as reported by the Associated Press, is that only individuals who have gone at least six months without health insurance coverage are eligible for the federally subsidized high-risk coverage. Allowing the 200,000 individuals with coverage through state pools to move to the federal program would dramatically increase the cost of the new high risk pools. So unless they’re willing to drop their current coverage for six months (unlikely given that the high risk pool coverage is generally desperately needed to pay existing medical costs) current high-risk enrollees are “locked in” to their current coverage.

The good news, of course, if for the 375,000 people the Associated Press reports are expected to sign up for the new high risk insurance program. For them, the program could well be a lifeline that gets them to 2014 (when such programs will presumably be unnecessary) with their finances intact.

But will the $5 billion be enough to fund the program to 2014? Not likely. The federal pool will operate alongside existing state pools while HHS will create a national program to serve residents of states with no existing pools or who opt out of the program. Funding the program for nearly four years may prove a more extensive task than Congress has budgeted. The Associated Press article describes a letter from Medicare economists warning that “the program could go through $4 billion in its first year and run out of money as early as 2011.”

If correct there are three likely alternatives. Starting with the least likely:

1. Require the states to pony up money (making Commissioner Oxendine a prophet).
2. Reduce the benefits provided to enrollees and increase their premiums, making the federal high risk pool look more like the state versions.
3. Pump more federal dollars into the program.

There are numerous moving pieces in the new health care reform legislation. High risk pools should be one of the easy ones. After all, high risk pools are a generally accepted, reasonably popular approach to reducing the number of uninsured Americans. As Commissioner Oxendine’s letter, the disappointment those in current state pools will feel, and the inadequate funding allocated to creating the new federal program all indicate, when it comes to health care reform, nothing seems to be easy.

How New Health Care Reforms Make Single Payer Less Likely

There are those who view the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the health care reform legislation signed into law by President Barack Obama, as the first step toward a complete government takeover of America’s health care system. While I don’t agree with their arguments, they do have a case to make. That is:

• because the reforms fail to restrain the out-of-control growth of medical costs, insurance premiums will continue to rise
• because the reforms place constraints on health insurance companies, the private sector will be squeezed between increases in the underlying cost of care and their ability to charge adequate premiums to cover those costs
• meanwhile the government-run health insurance exchanges, to be operational by 2014, which is also when Medicaid is set to dramatically expand, increases the percentage of health care coverage provided or made accessible by governments

Throw in a few other provisions (elements of the reform some say will undermine Medicare Advantage, the new taxes imposed on health insurance carriers and others), season to taste with paranoia and the belief that the recently passed health care reforms is merely the first steps down a path leading to a single payer system gains significant heft.

Given this scenario, one might expect folks on the left to be gleeful with the reforms. Many liberals publicly and fervently support a government-run health plan that would completely remove private health insurance companies from the marketplace. If they believed what emerged from Washington moved that goal closer, you’d expect them to celebrate, at least a little.

If so, the folks at Consumer Watchdog failed to get the memo. This group, led by Jerry Flanagan, considers health insurance companies to be the manifestation of evil in our plane of reality. OK, I’m paraphrasing here, but you get the idea. They are unabashed advocates of a single payer system for California and the nation.

On April 8th, wrote a letter to President Obama, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius, and members of Congress identifying what it calls loopholes in the newly enacted health care reform bill. (Consumer Watchdog Letter on Health Care Reform Loopholes). Among the group’s concerns is that the minimum benefit requirements to be proposed by HHS will preempt stronger minimum benefit standards at the state level, that its approach to Medicare Advantage could “push traditional Medicare into an economic death spiral,” that the law fails to attack recent price hikes by pharmaceutical companies, and that carriers will continue to be permitted to rescind coverage for intentional misrepresentation, without creating new regulatory oversight to ensure that exception is not abused by health plans.

Most interesting, however, is Consumer Watchdog’s fear that the new health care reform bill will prevent states from adopting a single payer system at least until 2017. Under the heading “States Rights to Innovate,” the letter states, “Under the current law, states must wait until 2017 for waivers from the federal government to use federal Medicaid, Medicare, tax subsidies
and other funds to support state alternatives to the private insurance market, whether that
be by adopting a state single-payer model or a state ‘public option.’”

Since states can’t divert funds from existing public programs to new government programs, the new health care reform law blocks initiatives to create single payer systems at the state level. In fact, the new reforms block states from creating a health plan to compete with private carriers (unless it can do so without federal funds, tax subsidies and the like).

I suppose what this proves is there is a balance in the universe. The same legislation some fear will inevitably lead to a single payer system is the same legislation that prevents states from creating a single payer system.

Of course some will argue that this simply delays the coming of a single payer system to 2017. However, think about the recent reform package. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It was passed by the slimmest of margins and only after intense debate and adroit legislative maneuvering. It’s passage was possible only because Democrats occupy the White House and have substantial majorities in both chambers of Congress. Yet the legislation has no public option and is built around private health insurance. Nonetheless it is criticized as “socialism” by some and a “government takeover” by others.

Does anyone realistically believe the country is going to move further to the left in future elections? That’s one of the reasons the Administration pushed so hard to pass health care reform in 2009. The party occupying the White House nearly always loses seats in mid-term elections. They knew the Democratic majorities resulting from the 2006 and 2008 elections were the high watermark for Democrats in Congress. Long before the tea party started brewing the Administration understood the 2010 elections would reduce their working majorities in Congress. Why would anyone think future Congresses would be even more liberal than this one?

That’s why Consumer Watchdog is concerned about the new health care reform package. It prevents them from moving forward with a state public option or single payer system until 2017. And by then, given the pendulum that is American politics, the odds of a government takeover of health care is likely to be slimmer than it is today.