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Legislative News and Views - Rep. Steve Green (R)

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Legislative Update (8-1-17)

Tuesday, August 1, 2017
Neighbors,
 
This Monday we received a positive report from the Department of Commerce regarding our insurance market. The Department released the preliminary rates for the 2018 individual insurance market. The individual market serves Minnesotans who do not receive health insurance through their employer or the government.
 
The preliminary rate projections indicate that the reforms House Republicans enactment this year could put an end to the double-digit premium increases was have seen for the last four years. We hope this will go a long way to undoing the damage that the implementation of Obamacare through MNsure has done to our insurance market.
 
If approved by the federal government, the measures we passed this session to address premium increases, known as the Minnesota Premium Security Plan, will result in premium decreases for tens of thousands of Minnesotan, as the rate projections show. This is in contrast to the double digit rate increases we have seen every year since 2014, including a nearly 60 percent increase in 2017.
 
According to the Minnesota Department of Commerce, rates would have risen by 25 percent or more in 2018 without the reforms we passed this session.
 
There remains a lot to be done, but these numbers show we are headed in the right direction toward making health insurance more affordable and undoing the damage MNsure has done.
 
Sincerely,
 
Steve