Health insurance exchanges are the centerpiece of the private health insurance reforms of the Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA). If they function as planned, these exchanges will expand health insurance coverage, improve the quality of such coverage and perhaps of health care itself, and reduce costs. Previous attempts at creating health insurance exchanges, however, enjoyed only mixed results. As part of successfully implementing the new exchanges, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the states must address issues that undermined the earlier attempts. These issues are:
- Adverse selection. It is absolutely necessary that exchanges be protected against adverse selection (the disproportionate purchase of health insurance by the least healthy individuals)—especially because, under the ACA, small-group and nongroup insurance options remain available outside the exchanges. However, a number of provisions of the ACA level the playing field inside and outside the exchange, and weaken incentives for adverse selection. These protections can also be enhanced by the states.
- Numbers of participants. Exchanges that include large numbers of enrollees, as well as a high percentage of the total number of enrollees who are participating in the entire insurance market, offer greater market power, economies of scale, more stable risk pools, and stronger protection against adverse selection. The ACA offers opportunities for expanding risk pools, which should be fully exploited.
- Market coverage and structure. The ACA permits both the combination and separation of small-group and nongroup risk pools and exchanges. It also allows the creation of regional or subsidiary exchanges. The advantages and disadvantages of pursuing these options must be carefully weighed.
- Choice without complexity. The exchange model created by the ACA presents consumers with structured choices. An important implementation decision will be whether to further structure choices or, alternatively, to offer maximum choice and flexibility within the constraints of the ACA.
- Transparency and disclosure. The ACA contains numerous provisions designed to maximize transparency and disclosure. Putting these requirements into operation will be one of the Act’s most important implementation tasks.
- Competition. The exchanges are intended to increase competition among insurers and focus that competition on value and price. A number of provisions of the ACA should help to facilitate this objective.
- Administrative costs. The ACA requires exchanges to fulfill a number of administrative functions that will add to their costs. Exchanges must find ways to reduce such internal costs, as well as the administrative costs to insurers and employers, if they are to offer better value to enrollees.
- Market or regulator? The ACA delegates to exchanges a number of regulatory responsibilities. Exchanges must certify health plans for participation and can exercise regulatory authority through this power. An important implementation choice will be whether exchanges should, on the one hand, maximize plan participation by minimizing certification requirements or, on the other hand, use their certification authority to limit exchange participation to high-value plans.
- Administering subsidies and mandates. The exchanges will play important roles in establishing insurance affordability, administering cost-sharing subsidies, and serving as a gateway to other public programs. It is particularly important that exchanges coordinate seamlessly with other public programs because participants will often move back and forth between an exchange, Medicaid, and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
- State, regional, or national exchanges? Although the ACA favors the creation of state exchanges, it also confers authority to create a federal exchange as well as a multistate insurance program, and it provides for the possibility of regional exchanges. Important policy choices will need to be made concerning which avenues particular states should pursue and how the federal government should react to state action—or inaction.
- Governance. The ACA provides very little guidance as to how exchanges should be governed. HHS and the states must carefully consider how the entities that govern exchanges should be structured and how they relate to other state and to federal institutions.
- Relationships with employers. Although exchanges must be employer-friendly if they are to succeed, the ACA offers little guidance in this regard. Such relationships nevertheless need to be a major focus of implementation efforts.
- Cost control. Exchanges have been sold as a mechanism for moderating the growth of health insurance costs. Achieving this objective will only be possible if exchanges are implemented so as to maximize competition, choice, and participation and to minimize administrative cost and adverse selection.
