What the 1.1 million new Obamacare Signups Do Not Tell Us

December 29th, 2013

Jonathan Cohn blogs:

The official enrollment number doesn’t tell us many things. It doesn’t tell us whether these people getting private (or public) coverage had insurance previously—or, if they had insurance, how much they were paying for it. It doesn’t tell us how many of these people have actually paid premiums, which is essential for coverage to take effect. It doesn’t tell us whether insurers have proper data on these people or what kind of access and protection the new coverage will give. It doesn’t tell us how many of the enrollees are in relatively good health or how many are in relatively poor health—or how that mix will affect insurance prices going forward.

In addition, the numbers do not appear to match the Administration’s own targets. According to internal projections, later reported by the Associated Press, officials expected more than 3.3 million enrollments by year’s end, with about 1.8 million of those coming through the federal website.

For all of those reasons, and a few others, it’s premature to say Obamacare is meeting expectations.