Obamacare sticker shock

Brace yourself for sticker shock — at your insurance agent’s office…The House Energy and Commerce Committee has released a report, based on internal documents from 17 insurance giants, including Aetna, Blue Cross and Kaiser. They estimate that when Obamacare kicks in next year, the average individual health insurance policy will go up in cost by 100 percent. For instance, the cost to a new customer of an individual policy is expected to nearly double, from about $1900 a year to over $3700. But that’s just the average. Some people will see price spikes of over 400 percent. The reason is that millions of uninsured people, many with expensive preexisting conditions, are being added to the insurance pool. At the same time, the government is mandating one-size-fits-all coverage that pays for every condition, from pregnancy to drug rehab, even if the buyer doesn’t want or need it. Gosh, if only someone had been able to predict that when you vastly increase covered medical services, it makes insurance more expensive, not cheaper. Unfortunately, that would require a tiny smidgeon of common sense. And this bill came out of Washington.