Opinion: 'Not Factually Accurate'? Who Knows

(Feb. 25) -- One of the testier moments of the health care summit was revealing in several ways, but mostly because it helped make clear why the public is so turned off to the whole health care reform debate. Even simple things get extraordinarily complicated.

The moment in question involved what should be a seemingly straightforward point of fact. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., at one point said that the Senate reform plan would raise premiums for people buying insurance in the individual market.

Not so, said President Obama: "It's estimated by the Congressional Budget Office that the plan we put forward would lower costs in the individual market for the average person ... by between 14 and 20 percent."

To which Alexander said: "The Congressional Budget Office report says that premiums will rise in the individual market as a result of the Senate bill."

To which Obama then responded: "Let me respond to what you just said Lamar, because it's not factually accurate. Here's what the Congressional Budget Office says. The costs for families for the same type of coverage as they're currently receiving would go down 14 to 20 percent. What the Congressional Budget Office says is that because now they've got a better deal, because policies are cheaper, they may choose to buy better coverage than they have right now, and that might be 10 to 13 percent more expensive than the bad insurance that they had previously."

How's that again? Because insurance is now cheaper, families who can barely afford coverage at today's rates will respond by buying more expensive policies?

Well, maybe the Congressional Budget Office report everyone is citing can clear things up.

Here's what that report actually says (on page 6): some changes in the law would cut premiums by a combined amount of 14 to 20 percent. So Obama is right there.

But the report also found that those savings would be more than offset, mainly by requirements in the Senate bill that force insurers to provide more generous, and more expensive, benefits.

The net effect of all these changes is that "the average premium per person" in the individual market "would be about 10 to 13 percent higher in 2016 than the average premium ... in that same year under current law."

In other words, premiums would go up, just like Alexander said.

Now it may be the case that these people are grateful for the extra insurance benefits and don't mind forking over the extra premiums. But that's different from saying that the higher costs result from people choosing to spend more on insurance, as Obama suggested.

But wait. It gets even more complicated. Under the Senate plan, more than half of these individual buyers would be able to get federal subsidies, which would definitely cut what they would pay "well below what would be charged for such policies under current law," the CBO says. So they'd save even more than the 20 percent savings Obama pointed to. But, of course, only if they're eligible.

And then there's another wrinkle: a skimpier Bronze insurance plan that individuals apparently could choose. And when you look at the Bronze plan, it's actually cheaper than the average plan without reform, by about $1,000 bucks, according to a separate CBO report.

So, who's right? Who knows? Maybe both. Maybe neither.

But if answers to simple questions like this are so difficult to come by, is it any wonder the public is a bit skeptical about the benefits of health reform?


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