CBS: Insurers backing out of the ObamaCare exchange markets
...The proposal to extend the open enrollment period, which has been endorsed by 10 Democratic senators, is a reaction to the well-documented problems with HealthCare.gov in its opening month. With many people having trouble applying for insurance through the website, and the administration setting a Nov. 30 deadline for the site to be fully functional, the senators say people need more time to sign up for coverage. The enrollment period is scheduled to end March 31. The senators haven’t asked for a specific new end date yet.

But expect to start hearing a significant amount of pushback from the industry, with a message focused on the fact that insurance premiums could skyrocket in 2015 if the enrollment period is extended. …

Right now, insurers need to submit 2015 rates to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services between April 1 and April 30, 2014. If the enrollment period ends in March, as currently scheduled, insurers will know exactly what their customer base looks like as they make projections about their 2015 rates.

But if people can still sign up after March 31, either while or after insurers are making those calculations, it creates a few problems. Here’s the big one: Most experts assume that young and healthy people — who are crucial to making the law’s finances work by offsetting the costs of sicker and older enrollees — are more likely to wait till the last possible moment or until they get sick to sign up for insurance.

If that’s true and they can’t be accounted for when insurers are projecting their 2015 rates because of extended enrollment, that could lead to an older and sicker pool when those calculations for 2015 are being made. That would likely increase rates. And generally, the uncertainty about the pools could cause insurers to err on the side of caution....