Improving Choices in Healthcare Coverage

Floor Speech

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Mr. BUDD. Mr. Speaker, the cost of health insurance is on the minds of many Americans this summer, and it should be.

Nearly half a million people in North Carolina buy their health insurance on the ObamaCare marketplace. The average price for these plans continues to go up each and every year.

This wouldn't be as much of an issue if there were many options to choose from, but, unfortunately, there are not. Blue Cross, the only insurer that is still in all 100 counties in our State, announced that they were raising rates by an average of nearly 19 percent going into 2017. Then they raised them again this year by over 14 percent. I expect them to do the same next year, the year after that, and in coming years after that.

It is clear to me that the individual mandate didn't actually lower the cost of health insurance, and bailing out big insurance companies certainly didn't help either.

Mr. Speaker, as you know very well, we need an off-ramp from ObamaCare. We need a solution that allows for more competition, because competition drives down prices and allows people to purchase health insurance without going bankrupt.

While we continue to work toward getting a full repeal and replace on the President's desk, I believe we should also pass a simple bill right now that would provide millions of Americans a way to buy more affordable health insurance

Short-term, limited-duration medical plans are designed to provide coverage for a limited time when someone is between health insurance policies--individuals who are between jobs, for example--but these plans are also exempt from having to abide by ObamaCare's regulatory regime.

The Obama administration was concerned with these plans becoming attractive alternatives to ObamaCare. So before they left office in 2016, they issued a regulation that defined these short-term policies as those that are less than 3 months long.

I believe strengthening these types of plans would be a huge step in the right direction. That is why, last month, I introduced a simple bill called the Improving Choices in Health Care Coverage Act.

This bill would do two simple things. It would allow people to stay on these less expensive, short-term medical plans for as long as 364 days, and it would allow them to renew these plans for multiple years.

According to the American Action Forum, which looked at different findings from the Congressional Budget Office, the Urban Institute, and the Commonwealth Fund, there seems to be a consensus that these plans would be attractive to consumers because of their low premiums, and, thus, enrollment would likely be into the millions.

I hear from constituents every time I go back home that their monthly premiums are way too high. Mr. Speaker, this bill is one way we can relieve some of their financial stress. With looming announcements by big insurance companies that they are again going to be increasing premiums, the time to act is now.

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