individual mandate
kkrisberg | April 21, 2017There was always an assumption that the Affordable Care Act would need time to find its sea legs. That’s why it included measures to shield insurers from the potential profit losses that inherently come with offering millions more people better health coverage at more reasonable prices. Insurers operate on profit margins and the ACA took that into account, for better or for worse.
But it’s still been a rocky road for insurers. (Insert argument here for single-payer health care, but that’s a different story.) On the patient side, with 20 million more Americans insured and growing accounts of…
kkrisberg | March 25, 2017Yesterday, House Republicans failed to find enough votes to pass their Affordable Care Act replacement. It was a very good day for the millions of Americans projected to lose their coverage under the GOP plan. But let’s be clear: Obamacare is not safe.
In a last-ditch effort to round up more votes, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., proposed an amendment that would have, beginning in 2018, allowed states to determine the kinds of essential health benefits required in insurance plans purchased with tax credits. Under Obama’s health care law, insurance plans sold via the federal health care…
lborkowski | November 17, 2014On Saturday, Healthcare.gov opened for enrollment in 2015 health insurance plans, and so far it’s proceeding without the horrific technical problems that greeted would-be enrollees last year. This year, as will be the case in future years, the enrollment window is just three months long. People can renew the coverage they had last year or choose a new plan. Those with incomes of between 100% and 400% of the federal poverty level (in 2014, $11,670 - $46,680 for a one-person household, $23,850 - $95,400 for a household of four) are eligible for subsidies to help them afford premiums.
The Obama…
lborkowski | June 28, 2012by Kim Krisberg
For me, there were few better places to hear about today's 5-4 Supreme Court ruling upholding the Affordable Care Act and its individual insurance mandate than at a meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Here in Charlotte, N.C., for APHA's Midyear Meeting, I was surrounded by hundreds of public health practitioners, researchers and advocates as we all watched the magnified scroll of Scotusblog.com, anxiously waiting for the decision.
At 10:08 a.m., the blog declared: "The individual mandate survives as a tax."
That was when the cheers (and tears) began. You…
lborkowski | June 20, 2012As we're waiting to learn whether the Affordable Care Act will survive the upcoming Supreme Court decision, it's a good time to remember what's at stake with the individual mandate -- the part of the law that's least popular with the public and that some Supreme Court Justices seem to find objectionable. I've written before about why the mandate, which requires everyone who can afford it to purchase health insurance or pay a penalty, is a necessary part of the healthcare law and is not the same as requiring everyone to buy broccoli. Now, the Washington Post's Sarah Kliff adds to the…
lborkowski | March 30, 2012Unless they've deviated from their normal procedure, the Supreme Court justices have now decided on how they'll rule on the Affordable Care Act - but, as the Washington Post's Robert Barnes points out, we'll have to wait until late June to hear their verdict. In the meantime, this is a good opportunity to recap the key issues in the case and highlight some of the more insightful commentary about them.
The first issue on which the Court heard arguments was whether it could rule on this case to begin with, since it involves a tax on people who don't have health insurance coverage (or a hardship…
lborkowski | March 23, 2011Exactly one year ago, President Obama signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act - the most sweeping change to US healthcare since the legislation that created Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. The law's most important achievement is its creation of a system that will slash our nation's shameful uninsurance rate by an estimated two-thirds once it's fully implemented.
Public opinion on the law is still mixed, and that's likely due to two things. First, many of the law's provisions won't kick in until 2014. Second, for those of us with a reliable source of affordable health…
lborkowski | December 14, 2010Yesterday a federal judge struck down the new healthcare law's individual mandate, which requires everyone to have health insurance. (Actually, the mandate doesn't apply to everyone: those who'd have to spend more than 8% of their income on coverage are exempt, as are undocumented immigrants - and if you don't have coverage, you pay a fine.) US District Judge Henry E. Hudson ruled that the individual mandate is unconstitutional, but he did not strike down other portions of the law or issue an injunction against its implementation. Two other district court judges have found the mandate…