New Jersey's Dept. of Banking and Insurance has posted individual market health plan prices for 2019. Thanks to the state's new reinsurance program, state-based individual mandate, and silver loading (actively encouraged by DOBI), unsubsidized enrollees will see price drops from 2018. According to DOBI, premiums are down 9% on average, and 22% below where they would be if not for the reinsurance program and the state individual mandate enacted this year. For the subsidized, it looks pretty much like status quo ante -- although network changes and plan design changes could alter that picture.
As was the case last year, AmeriHealth has sewn up all the lowest price points. AmeriHealth and Oscar are offering discounted silver plans off-exchange -- presumably because of silver loading (Cost Sharing Reduction, available only with silver plans and only on-exchange, is not priced into off-exchange silver). Horizon is not offering any off-exchange discounts, but it has dropped prices about 7% from last year. A few salient year-to-year comparisons below. Quoted premiums are for a 46 year-old -- where they're a clean 1.5 times the base rate posted by DOBI.
As was the case last year, AmeriHealth has sewn up all the lowest price points. AmeriHealth and Oscar are offering discounted silver plans off-exchange -- presumably because of silver loading (Cost Sharing Reduction, available only with silver plans and only on-exchange, is not priced into off-exchange silver). Horizon is not offering any off-exchange discounts, but it has dropped prices about 7% from last year. A few salient year-to-year comparisons below. Quoted premiums are for a 46 year-old -- where they're a clean 1.5 times the base rate posted by DOBI.
- The cheapest silver plan for a 46 year-old was $468 per month in 2018. This year, cheapest silver is $359, offered off-exchange only. They're both AmeriHealth, but they're not the same plan. The off-ex 2019 cheapest is a "Select Silver EPO", a new designation for AmeriHealth, and it's an HSA plan, which means that all services except mandatory free preventive care are subject to the deductible. The cheapest non-HSA silver is an AmeriHealth HMO ("Local Value"), for $381 per month. That plan may have a better network than the "Advantage" network, which in some areas at least is quite limited.
