Strange, but consumers getting ripped off may not be the worst part of what you are about to read.
It’s true your health insurance rates could go higher than necessary because the state’s insurance commissioner no longer has the authority to stop them, but that almost becomes incidental to the larger issue.
And the fact that folks in other states have seen significant drops in rates because their officials did their jobs and negotiated with insurers, seems merely annoying.
No, I’d say the worst part of this story — the part that should make you tremble with anger — is that your elected officials did this to you. And they did it on purpose.
That would include your state Senate. That would include your state House.
And that would include your governor.
In case you missed the headlines, your leaders recently decided that the state insurance commissioner’s power to negotiate rates should be suspended for the next two years. Now, monitoring rates is a large part of the commissioner’s job, so it’s not like this was some insignificant procedural move.
So why was it done?
Click here for the story in Tamp Bay Times
