--- title: One-Third of Counties Will Have Just One Obamacare Insurer by 2017 description: That's up from 7% in 2016. authors: - name: Alicia Adamczyk url: https://money.com/author/alicia-adamczyk/ at_money_since: 2015 articles: 201 covers: - Insurance - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit Cards - Economy and Politics - Education - Housing - Identity Theft - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Personal Finance - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://x.com/aliciaadamczyk former_staff: true published: '2016-08-29T14:40:03.000Z' modified: '2024-05-08T04:04:31.000Z' section: Insurance tags: - health - pubdesk word_count: 296 canonical: https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![141017_Money_Gen_FF_Healthcare](https://img.money.com/2014/10/141017_gen_ff_healthcare.jpg) More bad news for customers of the Affordable Care Act's healthcare marketplaces: According to a new analysis from the nonpartisan [Kaiser Family Foundation](http://kff.org/health-reform/issue-brief/preliminary-data-on-insurer-exits-and-entrants-in-2017-affordable-care-act-marketplaces/), almost a third of counties will have just one insurer participating in the exchanges by 2017, significantly more than the 7% of counties who had one option this year. That equates to 19% of all enrollees facing just one insurance option. The [New York *Times*](http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2016/08/28/us/politics/28reuters-usa-healthcare.html) reports this decrease in exchange competition can be attributed to UnitedHealth's planned exit from many marketplaces. [Aetna is also planning to scale back](https://money.com/aetna-obamacare-health-insurance/) its offerings in the government-run exchanges, saying high costs and low enrollment were hurting its bottom line. ![](https://public.tableau.com/static/images/HI/HIMap/2017Map/1_rss.png) var divElement = document.getElementById('viz1472480011598'); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName('object')\[0\]; vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth\*0.75)+'px'; var scriptElement = document.createElement('script'); scriptElement.src = 'https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz\_v1.js'; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); Leemore Dafny, a professor at Harvard Business School, told the [Wall Street](http://www.wsj.com/articles/health-insurers-pullback-threatens-to-create-monopolies-1472408338) *[Journal](http://www.wsj.com/articles/health-insurers-pullback-threatens-to-create-monopolies-1472408338)* that having so few options is “likely to lead to a very pricey exchange.” The analysis also says there could be just two insurance options in an additional 31% of counties, meaning about 60% of counties in the U.S. could have 2 or fewer ACA insurers in 2017. In 2016, Wyoming was the only state where 100% of counties had just one marketplace option; in 2017, Alabama, Alaska, Oklahoma, and South Carolina are likely to join it. ***Read Next: Where Turmoil in the Obamacare Marketplaces Will Hurt the Most*** Kaiser makes the point that the analysis is not definitive; insurers must lock in their plans between now and September, so the figures may change. Some bright spots: 62% of enrollees will still have three or more options in 2017, per the analysis (although that's down from 85% this year). And Cigna has said it is looking to move into additional marketplaces or expand its offerings, according to Kaiser. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Insurance", "item": "https://money.com/insurance/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Health Insurance", "item": "https://money.com/health-insurance/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "One-Third of Counties Will Have Just One Obamacare Insurer by 2017" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/", "name": "One-Third of Counties Will Have Just One Obamacare Insurer by 2017", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2016-08-29T14:40:03.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-05-08T04:04:31.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "One-Third of Counties Will Have Just One Obamacare Insurer by 2017", "articleSection": "Insurance", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2014/10/141017_gen_ff_healthcare.jpg", "width": 2559, "height": 1921, "caption": "141017_Money_Gen_FF_Healthcare" }, { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://public.tableau.com/static/images/HI/HIMap/2017Map/1_rss.png", "width": "", "height": "" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Alicia Adamczyk", "url": "https://money.com/author/alicia-adamczyk/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/alicia-adamczyk/#author", "image": "https://img.money.com/2016/01/alicia-headshot-2.jpg?quality=85&w=640&h=640&crop=1", "email": "alicia.adamczyk@moneymail.com", "sameAs": [ "https://x.com/aliciaadamczyk" ] } ], "publisher": "https://money.com/#organization", "datePublished": "2016-08-29T14:40:03.000Z", "description": "That's up from 7% in 2016.", "abstract": "That's up from 7% in 2016.", "@id": "https://money.com/obamacare-providers-2017/", "inLanguage": "en-US", "dateModified": "2024-05-08T04:04:31.000Z", "wordCount": 296, "keywords": [ "health", "pubdesk" ], "about": [ { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Insurance", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance" ] }, { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Health insurance in the United States", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_insurance_in_the_United_States" ] } ] } ] } ```