Health Insurance Health Reform Public Policy

The importance of competition in ACA marketplaces

Competition matters for markets…even health care markets. A paper by Van Parys (2018) relies on a database of plan premium and market characteristics among states with federally-facilitated health insurance exchange Marketplaces.  In this analysis, she finds that:

In 2018, Marketplace premiums were 50 percent ($180) higher, on average, in rating areas with monopolist insurers, compared to those with more than two insurers. This was driven by large premium increases for the monopolist insurers’ lowest-cost plans.

Medicaid expansion states and states with a metropolitan area had relatively lower rates, but states with a duopoly (or especially a monopoly) had they highest increase in premiums.

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