How state-based ACA exchanges are learning to get by on smaller budgets

The 13 states that run their own health insurance marketplaces are struggling with financial sustainability, writes CQ Roll Call’s Eric Mershon.

With the $5 billion in federal grants available to states that set up their own exchanges now largely gone, Mershon says states are trying out different methods to get by on a smaller budget, like increased user fees in Colorado and finding less expensive ways of advertising in Rhode Island.

“The marketplaces are having to make some sort of tough choices," said Jennifer Tolbert, director of state health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation. "They're trying to figure out how to balance all of the competing needs that they have for a well-run, well-functioning marketplace with, in some cases, some more limited dollars."

For more on how state exchanges plan to survive without so much federal assistance, click on the link below: