The Affordable Care Act, more commonly referred to by its acronym Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute signed into law on March 23 by President Barack Obama on 111th United States Congress and signed by him into effect as law by President Clinton in 1997.
The Affordable Care Act’s goal was to make healthcare more affordable for all Americans. It has done this by lowering premiums, offering free preventive services and allowing people to remain on their parents’ insurance until age 26.
1. Lower premiums
Lower premiums due to the Affordable Care Act have reduced health care costs for millions of individuals, thanks to its efforts at controlling costs while improving medical quality. These savings can be directly attributed to the ACA.
Under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), for example, insurers are required to spend at least 80% of your premium dollar on medical care and quality improvements rather than advertising, overhead expenses or bonuses for executives. Furthermore, tax credits and marketplaces exist so insurers compete for your business and help reduce healthcare costs.
Massachusetts provides substantial additional subsidies that help lower enrollees’ net premiums and cost sharing for those earning incomes under 300 percent of poverty line, which research shows can significantly boost coverage rates while simultaneously decreasing uninsured rates for people who pay higher net premiums.
2. More people insured
The Affordable Care Act made healthcare more accessible by making Medicaid and health insurance marketplaces easier to access for low-income individuals and families, thus decreasing uninsured rates among non-elderly adults from 28.9 million in 2019 to 27.5 million by 2021; an approximate reduction of 1.5 million from 2019.
Additionally, the Affordable Care Act prohibits insurers from discriminating against people with preexisting conditions and requires them to include essential health benefits in their plans. Furthermore, annual and lifetime limits have been prohibited as this had previously prevented some of the sickest from accessing care they needed.
3. More people with coverage
The Affordable Care Act made health insurance more accessible by lowering premiums and providing tax credits for coverage based on how much of an excess gap there is between plan costs and an individual’s share of income (such as 9.86 percent for those earning under 400% of poverty level)
The Affordable Care Act also restricts insurers’ ability to charge premiums that do not reflect actual medical costs by holding them responsible for allocating at least 80 cents of every premium dollar they collect towards actual medical costs. As of 2019, insurers had returned $1.37 billion in medical loss ratio rebates back to consumers.
4. More people with health insurance
Though the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has made health insurance more accessible, many still struggle to afford their medical bills. A recent Commonwealth Fund survey showed that one-third of working-age Americans foregone necessary care due to high costs within the past year.
The Affordable Care Act also introduced subsidies for individuals earning 400% or more of the federal poverty level, making its coverage more appealing to many middle-income workers. Unfortunately, President Trump is now pushing plans that don’t abide by ACA consumer protections that will make coverage more costly for both healthy people and sick ones alike; potentially leaving low-income consumers exposed to catastrophic medical costs.
Additionally, the Affordable Care Act has made preventive care free for 137 million American with private health insurance and thus provided many more people access to screenings such as cancer, diabetes and high blood pressure screenings.
5. More people with health care
The Affordable Care Act is helping families put money back in their pockets while simultaneously increasing demand for quality health care services. Furthermore, it protects consumers against unfair insurance practices like denying coverage to children with asthma, setting lifetime caps or cancelling your coverage due to an oversight in paperwork – practices often used by insurers when they deny coverage in these instances.
Additionally, the Affordable Care Act is helping improve health and save lives by expanding access to preventive services recommended by the United States Preventive Services Task Force without cost sharing requirements – with over 137 million Americans having received better preventive benefits since 2010.
