The Affordable Care Act is a set of comprehensive health reforms designed to make healthcare more affordable and accessible. Additionally, there are consumer protections designed to curb abuse from insurance providers.
If the Affordable Care Act is repealed, families like Cimorelli’s could lose coverage as a result. Here are just a few ways this would happen: 1. Stripping marketplace coverage.
1. Uninsured
Millions of Americans who would be affected by repealing the Affordable Care Act will have less money to spend at local businesses – particularly health care sector ones – as a result of losing coverage, which would in turn have an adverse effect on jobs according to Josh Bivens from Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
States that expanded Medicaid and received federal dollars to cover costs for marketplace insurance coverage will likely suffer more. Bivens’ research suggests these states would experience greater job loss outside of health care services.
Furthermore, the Affordable Care Act reduced prescription drug costs for seniors by closing the Medicare Part D “donut hole.” If this provision were repealed it could lead to higher prescription costs that hit lower-income households hard and reduced their spending power for goods and services. Striking down the ACA during a COVID-19 pandemic would impede recovery efforts as well as threaten both their health and financial security for millions of people worldwide.
2. Job loss
Job loss can have both psychological and financial repercussions. Studies show that unemployment increases anxiety, depression and life satisfaction decrease. Communities of color face particular difficulty here due to current and intergenerational systemic racism limiting access to healthcare and other essential social determinants of health – leading to greater chances of COVID-19 contracting and death and less ability to bear the additional expenses caused by job loss or medical bills.
Repealing the Affordable Care Act would leave people with less money for essential items like food and rent, leading to job loss across the board. This would particularly impact communities of color, women, and those who are the least educated. Furthermore, repealing could allow insurers to discriminate against female clients by charging them more simply due to being female – something which would disproportionately hurt women. It is estimated that up to 1.2 million jobs could be lost by repealing it.
3. Medical bills
The Affordable Care Act’s coverage expansions, premium and cost-sharing subsidies have allowed millions of people to afford healthcare they require and still have money left over for food and housing costs – ultimately contributing to job creation.
Reducing spending through repeal of ACA funding measures would decrease expenditures, thus slowing overall economic growth and impacting jobs across industries–both health care related and others.
As one example, eliminating ACA drug rebates and Medicare Part D “donut hole” would increase prescription drug costs for millions of seniors, while reinstating arbitrary and politicized Independent Payment Advisory Board and Sustainable Growth Rate programs, as well as unfunded mandates requiring medical practitioners to comply with Medicare pay-for-performance rules would force physicians to spend more time complying with budget-sensitive federal officials than providing care based on patients’ needs and preferences. This would further hinder innovation of new, more effective treatments.
4. Taxes
Taxes are government charges on goods or services to raise revenue for public goods and services such as roads, schools, social safety net programs, national defense and law enforcement. Furthermore, taxes can also serve to redistribute wealth between generations or income levels – these may include excise taxes such as those levied against alcohol consumption, carbon emissions emissions and pornography as well as consumption taxes such as sales taxes.
Repeal of the individual mandate and elimination of cost sharing reductions would raise premiums significantly for middle class families without insurance or employer-provided coverage, especially those with preexisting conditions. When combined with loss of mandate penalty and expansion of Medicaid eligibility, such higher premiums could make getting health coverage unaffordable for many.
At the same time, repeal of ACA taxes would confer substantial tax cuts on wealthy Americans–including billionaires whose fortunes have seen dramatic surges during this pandemic–thereby widening economic disparities already created by COVID-19 pandemic.