Another Reason Obamacare Costs Are Headed Through the Roof

Jim Angle reports:

Parts of ObamaCare are starting to fray, even before full implementation.

The Obama administration now says a special system of exchanges designed to make it easier for small businesses to provide insurance will be delayed an entire year -- to 2015.

"Lots of small businesses struggle with providing insurance for their workers so this was supposed to facilitate it and make it easier for small business to do this," said Jim Capretta of the Ethics and Public Policy Center. "It was a huge portion of the sale job. When they passed the law in 2010 there were many senators and members of Congress who were saying 'I am doing this because it's going to help small businesses.'"

The exchanges were designed to give workers a range of choices supported by dollars from their employers. But now they will have only one choice until 2015, which could mean they can't shop for insurance that includes their current providers. Capretta said the administration is "way" behind schedule.  

Since insurance is more expensive for small businesses, many of which have no obligation under the law to provide coverage, analysts now fear many might just stop trying and let workers go on the soon-to-be-launched state exchanges.

Sara Teppema of the Society of Actuaries -- which did an exhaustive study of ObamaCare -- said that "even if it's just a small change of people who are leaving the employment-based insurance and coming into the individual insurance market, their costs and their numbers will overwhelm those who are currently uninsured."  

That means costs would increase.