It's early days here in the rollout of the Affordable Care Act.
Friday morning, the Kaiser Family Foundation's Larry Levitt, an expert in health insurance policy, sent out a series of tweets. He said he hoped they were "concise thoughts on enrollment mix and the ACA." Indeed, the tweets are a quick and insightful read:
Relevant risk pool for looking at the mix of enrollees is a state, including newly purchased coverage inside and outside exchanges. (1/6)
— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014
Age matters a little. Young adults cross subsidize older adults with 3:1 age rating instead of about 5:1. But the effect is modest. (2/6)
— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014
Health matters much more than age. Insurers would rather get a healthy 60 year old than a sick 25 year old. (3/6) — Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014
We’re not going to know about health mix anytime soon. Even insurers won’t know a lot when they have to set premiums for 2015. (4/6) — Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014
It’s halftime for open enrollment. The young and healthy will likely enroll in larger numbers in the 2nd half. (5/6)
— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014
Risk corridors and reinsurance act as big shock absorbers in the first 3 years to protect against a bad enrollment mix. (6/6)
— Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) January 10, 2014