Many have speculated that the Obama administration isn’t prepared to roll out ObamaCare. Some have speculated that even if the administration were prepared, the rollout would still be chaotic with job losses, rate shock, employer dumping, and the like. But since the Obama administration has been remarkably secretive about the status of its implementation efforts, no one has a better perspective on its preparedness, and the potential for chaos, than the administration itself. That’s why the decision to delay the implementation of ObamaCare’s employer mandate for one year is so illuminating.


Implementing the law without the employer mandate will definitely be very chaotic. (How can the federal government determine eligibility for the law’s subsidies if it doesn’t know whether workers received an offer of adequate coverage from an employer? Will the delay cause even more employers to drop coverage? Will it lead to some workers not receiving subsidies who otherwise would? Will employers’ and workers’ responses to the delay affect the risk profile of those who seek coverage through the exchanges? If so, how will that affect insurers, who have already filed their rates based on the assumption that the employer mandate would be in place? Will this delay lead to more delays, and ultimately to repeal? Will it increase political pressure for repeal of the individual mandate?) The whole purpose of the employer mandate was to reduce the economic and political upheaval that the rest of ObamaCare will unleash.


The decision to delay this mandate suggests that, from the Obama administration’s uniquely informed vantage point, the chaos that will result from its delay will be less than what would result from implementing it when the law requires. The administration doesn’t go around looking for ways to make implementation harder. This decision can only be understood as an effort to take the path of least resistance — and if this is the path of least resistance, then ObamaCare itself must be even more chaotic. This decision is the best window we have to see how nervous the administration is about what lies ahead.