people like Kay Lamberti, age 29, a former nursing assistant now working a temp job in Providence, R.I., aren't cheering for the health exchanges just yet. Ms. Lamberti has gone for five years without health insurance and doesn't plan on getting it until she gets a higher paying job.
"It's not in the budget," says Lamberti. "I'm pretty healthy at the moment and I know things could happen, having had worked in the healthcare field, but I can't afford it based on that chance."
Rational decision (in her mind). Why buy something you don't need? Health insurance isn't sexy like the iPhone 5.
"The fear in the Obama administration is you're going to get the sick people signing up and the nonsick not signing up and that would be a disaster. The insurance pools won't work,"
A failure in the making?
You mean like PCIP?
Officials expect that if 7 million uninsured enroll in the marketplaces this year, 2 million to 2.5 million of those need to be young adults in order to make the insurance rates work.
Roughly 30% of Obamacare enrollee's need to be young, healthy people.
Even if they hit those numbers, I doubt that will be enough to make it work.
Health insurance carriers know that 20% of insureds generate about 80% of large claims. If Obamacare is to work they probably need something like 5 million healthy people to sign up if they truly do get 7 million enrolled overall.
Yeah, this is going to be interesting.
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