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The whole point of the ACA’s community rating rule is to ensure people w/pre-existing conditions can’t be charged more than healthy enrollees. “Wellness programs” basically guarantee that healthier people will be far more likely to hit the requirements while sicker folks can’t.
Instead of charging HIGHER premiums to sicker people, they simply reverse the process by charging “LOWER” premiums to healthy people. in reality it amounts to the same damned thing, since the base premium is increased to begin with.
This is no different than gas stations which say they charge $0.10 “less” if you pay by cash than credit card to avoid being accused of charging “more” for credit card payments to cover the processing fee.
even worse: This amounts to Trump turning “wellness programs” into VOLUNTARY medical underwriting. Instead of the insurance carrier going through the bother of cherry-picking the premiums for the enrollees, the enrollees DO IT FOR THEM by effectively cherry-picking themselves.
