Why A Federal Exchange Is the Best of Obamacare's Bad Options

In less than ten months, fifty different Obamacare exchanges (one per state) will be required to start accepting and processing citizen enrollments in health insurance plans; all insurance coverage must begin on January 1, 2014. Federal law requires each exchange to carry out a costly and difficult mission: the task of building the bureaucratic infrastructure each exchange needs to do its job in the time allotted looks next to impossible. AAI's latest paper, "Why A Federal Exchange Is the Best of the Bad Options that Obamacare Gives to Arkansas," discusses the many unnecessary burdens that Governor Beebe's proposal for a "hybrid" or "partnership" exchange will place on Arkansas, such as its gigantic expense, extraordinary bureaucratic burdens, elimination of political responsibility, and enhanced vulnerability to identity theft.