Obama Concedes CF was Right About Slacker Mandate

I hate to toot my own horn (wink wink), but a few months ago, I wrote that a “slacker mandate” included in the federal health care bill would fail to reduce the number of uninsured, and could increase the cost of insurance. 

This was based on Pennsylvania’s mandate (which actually extends to age 29, longer then the federal mandate of age 26) that, as I predicted, did not reduce the cost of insurance or the number of uninsured.

It appears the Obama administration has recognized my wisdom, noting that the mandate will increase the cost of insurance for each family by an additional 1%, and it will cost, on average, over $3,000 for each new “child” added to a parent’s plan.  From the New York Times:

The health department estimated that the average cost to cover each new enrollee would be $3,380 in 2011, $3,500 in 2012 and $3,690 in 2013.

The cost will be borne by all families with employer-sponsored insurance, with family premiums expected to rise by about 1 percent, the government said.

This cost is over 40% higher than covering those same “adult children” in the individual market.  From the Washington Post:

Group health plans, such as those sponsored by employers, can charge employees extra to cover adult children only if they already base their premiums on the number of children the employee enrolls — as opposed to offering a flat premium for families of all sizes.

If the costs are spread across all families with employer-sponsored coverage, family premiums will rise about 1 percent in 2012, the government estimated. In the individual market, premiums for adding young adults are estimated to average $2,400 in 2012, the government said.