RI Center For Freedom & Prosperity: “State Cannot Afford Operation of HealthSourceRI”

As readers may know, ObamaCare RI, a.k.a., HealthSourceRI (funny that they had to give it a different name), was created via Executive Order by Governor Chafee with federal funds that disappear next year.

HealthSourceRI has turned into the consummate bloated, expensive and unnecessary governmental bureaucracy without even accomplishing one of its important claims of increasing Rhode Islanders’ healthcare options, a claim that laid the foundation for a corresponding implication by its proponents about increased affordability of coverage. Not only has health insurance in Rhode Island not gotten cheaper since the creation of HealthSourceRI, the number of health insurance companies offering coverage in Rhode Island has not increased. In fact, this is another fact that casts strong doubt about the necessity of HealthSourceRI: it administers (too strong a word?) policies offered by at most three companies. In the case of individual coverage, HealthSourceRI “administers” exactly one company: Blue Cross Blue Shield. $16 – $20 million per year to do only that?

In a statement released earlier this afternoon, Mike Stenhouse at the RI Center For Freedom & Prosperity raises another serious concern about the existence of HealthSourceRI: its (lack of) affordability.

January 16, 2014

Providence, RI – Following the Governor’s Wednesday night address and after initial review of his 2015 budget, where it is obvious that significant state funds will soon be needed to continue operation of the state’s healthcare exchange, the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a nonpartisan public policy think tank, today called on public officials to consider termination of the state’s operation of the HealthSourceRI exchange, and instead transfer its management to the federal government, which currently operates exchanges in dozens of other states.

The exchange was originally formed in Rhode Island by executive order by Governor Chafee as part of the implementation of President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, and which made federal funds available for its construction and launch through the end of 2014. It is anticipated that ongoing operation of HealthSourceRI could cost Ocean Staters over $20 million per year.

“The exchange is a federal mandate, it is very expensive to operate, and it is clear that we cannot afford it once federal funds expire. Our own General Assembly rejected operation of the exchange in the first place, so how can we justify burdening Rhode Island taxpayers with footing the bill,” asked Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center, which plans to conduct further research into exploring the process of executing this transfer.

Contact: Mike Stenhouse: 401-429-6115, info@rifreedom.org

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