The Obamacare Secret at the Heart of the Shutdown: Insurers Made Billions at Taxpayer Expense

https://amac.us/newsline/politics/the-obamacare-secret-at-the-heart-of-
the-shutdown-insurers-made-billions-at-taxpayer-expense/

The 42-day federal shutdown forced by Democrats thrust the economics of 
Obamacare into the limelight, and exposed an uncomfortable truth: An 
insurance industry whose executives are increasingly liberal donors has 
seen its earnings soar with the injection of taxpayer-funded subsidies 
that propped up Barack Obama’s signature health program from collapse.

The nation’s largest health insurance companies have seen good business 
since Obamacare was first passed in 2010 and fully implemented in 2014. 
This has come in no small part because of federal government subsidies to 
the insurance industry, which government estimates show totaled $1.8 
trillion in 2023 alone.

Those subsidies were greatly expanded by the Biden administration during 
the COVID-19 pandemic as an emergency measure, but Democrats have fought 
to keep them permanent.    

Obamacare brought health insurance companies historic profits
A Just the News analysis of public financial records from four of the 
nation’s largest health insurance companies found that net earnings 
ballooned about 216% from 2010 to 2024. UnitedHealth Group in particular, 
which dominates the industry with a market share of around 15%, saw the 
largest explosion of profits. The other three companies, Elevance, 
Centene, and Cigna also experienced a marked growth in net earnings after 
the implementation of Obamacare.

The healthcare legislation was also a boon for these companies’ stock 
prices. One study found the weighted average of health insurance stock 
prices has grown 1,032% from 2010—when the law was passed—and 448% from 
2013—the year the legislation’s key provisions were implemented. 

This performance far outstripped the most popular S&P 500 exchange-traded 
fund, which grew 251% and 139%, respectively, the Paragon Health Institute 
reported last year. ETFs are designed to track the performance of specific 
stock indices and, as such, generally represent average market growth.

The companies’ earnings success has drawn the attention of President 
Trump, who on Sunday called Obamacare a scam by Democrats that benefits 
the health insurance industry. 

“Democrats claim to be working for ‘the little guy,’ and driving down your 
Health Insurance, but the OBAMACARE SCAM goes STRAIGHT TO THEIR BEST 
FRIENDS IN THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY. THEY ARE MAKING A ‘KILLING,’ while 
Health Coverage only gets WORSE,” Trump posted to Truth Social. 

Take from the public and give to donors
“If Democrats get their way again, they’re in for another HUGE Payday at 
the expense of the American People. NO DEAL! Republicans should give money 
DIRECTLY to your personal HEALTH SAVINGS ACCOUNTS that I expanded in our 
GREAT BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL,” Trump added.

In recent years, individuals and PACs associated with these four health 
insurance companies have increasingly donated to Democratic presidential 
candidates—namely Biden and his vice president, Kamala Harris—whose 
administration expanded Obamacare subsidies, while contributing at much 
lower rates to candidate Trump. 

The 2024 election illustrates this trend. Individuals associated with 
UnitedHealth Group contributed a total of $742,271 to Kamala Harris in the 
2024 election, dwarfing the $158,000 received by the Trump campaign. 
Individuals associated with Centene contributed $225,622 to Harris and 
only $22,804 to Donald Trump. Individuals associated with Cigna sent 
$265,518 to Harris’ campaign compared to $99,930 to Trump’s. The only 
exception appears to be Elevance, which the records show did not make 
federal contributions in the 2024 cycle, according to OpenSecrets. 

In earnings projections and investor calls, the insurance companies admit 
that fading subsidies would have a big impact on their bottom line. They 
have told their investors about plans to raise premiums on Obamacare plans 
and even exit markets to preserve their profit margins, showing how 
dependent the large companies have become on the government-backed 
exchanges.

Corporations admit they are reliant on public money
UnitedHealth Group CEO Tim Noel told investors in an Oct. 28 earnings call 
that if his company could not negotiate “sustainable” rates, it would 
withdraw from markets and raise rates. He estimated that these efforts 
would likely result in two-thirds of its Obamacare customers dropping 
enrollment.   

“Where we are unable to reach agreement on sustainable rates, we are 
enacting targeted service area reductions,” Noel told investors. “We 
believe these actions will establish a sustainable premium base — while 
likely reducing our ACA enrollment by approximately two-thirds.”

Elevance, an Indianapolis-based insurance company, also cut its 2025 
earnings guidance in July after increased healthcare utilization surged 
costs in government-backed programs, including both ACA markets and 
Medicare Advantage. Centene also pulled its guidance for investors, seeing 
market difficulty on the horizon. 

The four companies did not respond to email requests for comment from Just 
the News. 

“It is a form of corruption, it is a form of corporate welfare to very 
profitable insurance companies, and it has to stop,” Rep. Mariannette 
Miller-Meeks, R-Iowa, told the Just the News, No Noise TV show on Monday. 

“More importantly, it doesn’t bring health care costs down. It may make it 
more affordable for one person, but it doesn’t have any incentive for the 
insurance companies to bring down health care costs. So all you’re doing 
is…that you’re continuing ratcheting up premiums, because the insurance 
companies are getting directly subsidized by the taxpayers,” she 
continued. 

Unused insurance means more profit in insurance company coffers
The Obamacare insurance exchanges also have another major flaw that fuels 
corporate profits. About a third of all subsidized Obamacare health plans 
go unused by the insured, meaning these plans translate into pure profits 
for the health insurance companies, completely at the expense of the 
American taxpayer. 

During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, President Joe Biden signed 
into law a bill that enhanced the Obamacare subsidies broadly as an 
emergency measure, which opened the door for such over-coverage. It also 
raised the qualifying income cap for the tax credits to 400% of the 
poverty level or $128,000 for a family of four. 

“These are not about the ACA subsidies, like the original Obamacare 
subsidies don’t expire,” Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-S.D., told the John Solomon 
Reports podcast. “This is about the COVID-era tax credits that layer on 
top of that, and the tax credits don’t go to Americans, they go directly 
to insurance companies.

He said, “many people can get free policies through these pancaking 
layered tax credits,” and some “people don’t even realize they’re double 
covered” because of deceptive sales tactics. 

“40% of these policies have never had a single claim applied to them. It’s 
amazing […] It shows that these are phantom policies, people aren’t using 
them, they aren’t making Americans healthier. Instead, they are just 
checks written to the insurance companies,” Johnson said. 

This expansion “often [resulted] in federal taxpayers footing the bill for 
all, or nearly all, premium costs for silver and bronze plans, as well as 
gold plans,” the Paragon Institute concluded. Bronze, Silver, and Gold 
describe increasing levels of insurance plans that decrease deductible 
costs and lower cost-sharing as you climb the rungs. 

35% of enrollees never file a claim
“Large insurers benefit greatly from phantom enrollment, as they collect 
billions of dollars in taxpayer funds to cover individuals who cost them 
nothing,” wrote Niklas Kleinworth, Liam Sigaud, and John Graham in a 
Paragon Health Institute policy brief last month.

The data show that nearly 12 million enrollees, about 35% of all people 
enrolled in the Obamacare exchange, are actually zero-claim enrollees. 
This means that their health coverage did not translate into actual health 
care. 

Paragon found that the average profile of these enrollees is someone who 
is healthy and likely does not need full coverage for care. Additionally, 
the researchers identified worrying data that many were enrolled in full 
coverage without their knowledge, raising fraud concerns and leaving 
taxpayers to pick up the tab.

But what caused this pattern of perverse incentives? The expanded 
Obamacare subsidies that are now at risk due to the government shutdown, 
the researchers say. 

“Our analysis shows that these enrollees are not just healthy enrollees 
with no need for care. They are part of a larger story about how Biden 
COVID credits are driving perverse incentives,” the Paragon authors wrote.


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November 5, 2024 - Congratulations President Donald Trump.  We look 
forward to America being great again.

We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that 
stupid people won't be offended.

Every day is an IQ test. Some pass, some, not so much.

Thank you for cleaning up the disasters of the 2008-2017, 2020-2024 Obama 
/ Biden / Harris fiascos, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the 
The World According To Garp.  Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood 
queer liberal democrat donors.