Brown Administration Continues Efforts To Replace MCO Tax

Officials with Gov. Jerry Brown’s (D) administration say that efforts to rework the expiring managed care organization tax are ongoing, Capital Public Radio’s “KXJZ News” reports (Orr, “KXJZ News,” Capital Public Radio, 11/19). Background The current MCO tax expires in June 2016. In July, federal officials said they would not reauthorize the formula California uses. ...

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UnitedHealth’s Threat To Leave Exchanges Not Expected To Mean Much in California

UnitedHealth Group’s announcement this week that it may pull out of Affordable Care Act exchanges is not expected to have much of an impact on Covered California, experts said, but the move could have serious repercussions in other exchanges. Although the for-profit company hasn’t been a major player in most exchanges and is a late-comer ...

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Biggest Insurer Threatens to Abandon Health Law

The biggest U.S. health insurer said it has suffered major losses on policies sold on the Affordable Care Act’s exchanges and will consider withdrawing from them, adding to worries about the future of the marketplaces at the heart of the Obama administration’s signature health law. The disclosure by UnitedHealth Group Inc., UNH 0.92 % which ...

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Lawmakers Press Obama for Meeting on ObamaCare Tax

A bipartisan group of lawmakers is requesting a meeting with President Obama to discuss repealing ObamaCare’s “Cadillac Tax.” The 40 percent tax on high-cost health insurance plans, set to take effect in 2018, was intended to help restrain healthcare costs, but it has drawn opposition from some lawmakers on both sides of the aisle worried ...

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Covered California Touts Early Enrollment, But There’s A Cloud on the Horizon

Covered California has signed up more than 34,000 new individuals for health benefits since open enrollment started Nov. 1, exchange officials said Thursday. That’s about 2,000 a day and “very strong enrollment” for so early in the sign-up period that extends through Jan. 31, said executive director Peter Lee. But there’s a cloud on the ...

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Pharma’s Bizarre Pricing Shrug

The drug industry is in denial about the seriousness of its pricing problem. Throughout this autumn, as the issue of drug pricing erupted from a long-simmering controversy into a full-blown headache, pretty much every CEO of note in biotech and pharma had to address the subject, and their tone was largely defensive and dismissive. There were vague promises of moderation, ...

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