COMMITTEE on WAYS and MEANS

Chairman Dave Camp

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President Obama Continues His “Say One Thing, Do Another” Tour
President preaches to students about college affordability as his health care law pushes costs of attending college further out of reach
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
What a difference just a few days makes.  In April, President Obama traveled to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) to wax poetic about “college affordability.”  Not surprisingly, left out of the conversation was any mention that students’ health insurance premiums were about to skyrocket, in part, because of ObamaCare.

According to a May 1 article in the The News & Observer, 220,000 students in the UNC system will see their monthly health insurance premiums nearly double from a range of $61 to $77 per month to a range of $118 to $133 per month next year.  Bruce Mallette, UNC Vice President for academic affairs attributed the premium increases to, among other things, ObamaCare and its new federal mandates.

UNC-CH student Kate Davis Jones stated that, “A lot of students are going to be very surprised by this and at a loss for what to do, especially on such a short notice for the next semester.  I think it’s going to cause a lot of students to be boxed out of their education if they’re not able to afford the mandated insurance.”

Hannah Gage, chairwoman of the UNC Board of Governors, called the rising health insurance costs “very disturbing.”  
Unfortunately, these massive premium increases are a sign of things to come for college students across the country if ObamaCare remains on the books.  That is exactly why Congressional Republicans are committed to repealing ObamaCare and clearing the path for real reforms that reduce the cost of health insurance.
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