Obamacare Risk Corridors Program to the Rescue?

As part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Congress included a provision called the "risk corridors program" that collects money from insurance companies making money and then distributes it to companies losing money. The program is set to run through 2016, but with a severe limitation. Congress in 2014 passed, and the president signed, a budget measure that cuts off supplemental funding for the program from the public coffers. Now, with insurers still facing a $2.87 billion shortfall just for 2014, the program has managed to collect only $362 million. Ironically (or maybe not), when the nation's largest insurer, UnitedHealth, announced Thursday that it couldn't sustain the losses it's incurring under Obamacare and might leave the exchanges, HHS tried to reassure all insurance companies by saying it would "explore other sources of funding for risk corridors payments, subject to the availability of appropriations. This includes working with Congress on the necessary funding for outstanding risk corridors payments." Stay tuned.

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