Impact of the Affordable Care Act on North Carolina uninsured

In order to make insurance affordable to all there were extensive private health insurance regulatory reforms, particularly in the small group and non-group markets, there were tax credits offered to the smallest lowest-wage employers for the purchase of health insurance, there were reductions in cost-sharing associated with recommended preventive care. For example if you signed up with a fitness center you can get a 50% discount on your insurance. The market exchange was established for the purchase of private coverage plus subsidies for the individual purchase of coverage and for the cost-sharing of the modest income. “The affordable care act also expanded the eligibility for the Medicaid program to all non-elderly with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level ($23,000 to $32,000 for a family of four in 2012) starting in 2014, which helped phase out the Medicare prescription drug benefit coverage gap, a.k.a. the “doughnut hole”.” To make sure that everyone is complying with the rule of everyone needs to have healthcare coverage there was a penalty set up for those that failed to comply. The penalty was if you did not have insurance by the set date you will receive a tax penalty that you will have to pay when filling your taxes. There are financial requirements that large- and medium sized

In 2009 there were 50.7 million people, 16.7% of the population, without health insurance. Americans all over the country are working and yet they still can’t afford to pay the high cost of health insurance for themselves and their families. Under the Affordable Care Act of 2010, which was signed by Obama on March 23, 2010, thirty two million Americans who were previously not eligible for Medicaid may now have the opportunity to be covered. If this act is passed in North Carolina then it will be expanded to cover nearly all of the 1.5 million North Carolinians who are without health insurance. If more Americans are covered under the Medicaid that they need then

One of the main components that had given the Affordable Care Act issues with the uninsured rate in the United States is the growth of the Medicaid program. The Affordable Care Act granted all 50 states billions of dollars in federal financial aid to increase their Medicaid program to insure people who made up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. Starting at the beginning of 2016, the federal government reduced its federal aid, covering less than 10 percent of what was promised, which ended up putting more of the responsibility of insuring Medicaid qualified Americans on the states. This caused a fallout of state governors being against ObamaCare, resulting with having 21 states declining any federal funding or expands their

As documented by NCJustice.org (2014), North Carolina has rejected millions of dollars that could provide medical coverage for more than a half million uninsured people. The acceptance of federally allocated dollars would greatly help the working poor. The working poor make too much money to qualify for Medicaid and not enough to pay for private insurance.

North Carolina has the highest index of the uninsured population approximately 1.6 million. Being uninsured has a profound impact on the health and well-being of the people. The ACA had a significant impact on the different population categories of North Carolina. According to The Affordable Care Act 2014, Medicaid will cover most low-income people if Federal Poverty Level (FPL) is no greater than 138 percent (Milsted, 2013). The people that have more impact are the children six to eighteen, working parents, nonworking parents, and childless adult. Prior to Affordable Care Act, Medicaid was limited to a specific group of low-income individuals, such as children less than six, pregnant women, elderly and disabled. Childless

Prior to the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), North Carolina’s (NC) uninsured population in 2009 was estimated at 1.7 million people under the age of 65. This equates to 20.4% of the population (Milstead, 2013).

Blumenthal, D., & Collins, S. (2014, July 17). Health Care Coverage under the Affordable Care Act — a progress report. The New England Journal of Medicine, 275-281. http://dx.doi.org/10.1056/NEJMhpr1405667

The Federal government will be paying the state “ most of the costs for covering the new eligible: 100 % of the Medicaid costs for newly eligible clients for the first three fiscal years 2014 to 2016, and declining to 90% in 2020” (North Carolina Institute of Medicine, 2014, p. 2). The Affordable Care act also funded North Carolina for Prevention and Public heath Trust for promoting prevention, wellness, and public health, “ACA granted $750 million in FY 2011 increasing to dollar two billion in FY 2015 and each year thereafter” (Silberman, 2013, p 28). According to Middle Class Tax Relief and Job creation Act 2012, “the cut $6.25 billion over 9 years”, the fund instead of reach dollar two billion in 2015, it will reach it only in 2022 and the funds will remain at one billion until 2018 (Silberman, 2013, p 28).

But unless the state reverses course and expands Medicaid coverage, South Carolina’s $1.1 billion share of the national program will be distributed to other states while its citizens get nothing in return. In other words, the state’s taxpayers will be on the hook for $1 billion, with the number of uninsured exceeding the combined populations of Greenville, Charleston and Columbia. (Populations of South Carolina Cities, 2010)

Although North Carolina has chosen not to expand Medicaid, other provisions of the ACA still go into effect. The ACA will still increase insurance coverage because North Carolina residents who currently are eligible for Medicaid but are not currently on it will now have to sign up due to the mandate for nearly everyone to acquire insurance (Holahan, Buettgens, Carroll & Dorn, 2012). The other advantage is a simplified Medicaid eligibility enrollment system and federal grants for navigators to help people with understanding health insurance options (Short, 2013). North Carolina residents will still see some benefits with the U.S. implementation of health care reform but not all of the proposed benefits.

I’m sure you have heard many debates, discussions, and opinions about the law ObamaCare. Do you know what this law was implemented for? Do you know why some could support it or want it repealed? Do you realize how much money one could leave the taxpayers to pay for their unpaid medical bills because they could not afford insurance? “ObamaCare, officially called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) but more often called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for short, reforms the health insurance industry and the American health care system as a whole” (ObamaCare Facts). Barack Obama and the Supreme Court ruling in 2012 gave Americans better rights and more protection for access to universal affordable quality healthcare to the uninsured population. ObamaCare was not designed to change the way one gets insurance, but to alleviate the national health care crisis of forty-four million uninsured Americans. I chose to do my research paper over this particular topic because I wanted to learn more information on how the working middle class could obtain insurance for them and/or their families. I also wanted to know how people who are uninsured could have access to ObamaCare and what ObamaCare actually does for the uninsured.

The Affordable Care Act tremendously expanded the Medicaid program to cover more uninsured Americans. Prior to the ACA, many low-income childless adults were left without healthcare coverage. However, the ACA expansion brought access to healthcare coverage to most adults under the age of 65, which have an income at or below 138% of the federal poverty level, equivalent to less than $16,245 for an individual. Under the ACA, states have the option to further expand Medicaid themselves. However,

Although the act falls short of achieving truly universal coverage, 9 million uninsured people have received coverage so far. Market reforms have not hurt the insurance industry’s profitability, prices for individual insurance have been lower than expected, and government costs so far have been less than initially projected. (Mark A Hall, Richard Lord, 2016)

On March 23, 2010, President Barak Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (commonly known as the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or “ObamaCare”) into law, and on June 28, 2012, the United States Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the ACA and its different mandates. The Affordable Care Act seeks to lower the cost of health insurance in America while also increasing its quality by using consumer safeguards, regulations, taxes, subsidies, and other reforms. Many observations and predictive outcomes have been made by both those who support and those who oppose the act by considering the economic impact that a greater access to care, cheaper costs for premiums, and certain federal regulations will have. When building an argumentative case for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the first difficulty lies in how to interpret the vast amounts of data. Since there are so many components to the law, it is possible to make a reasonable case with any viewpoint and simply spin certain information and evidences to fit that viewpoint. This paper will attempt to use actual results and quantified data to create an impartial summary of the economic effects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act so far and also predicts its effects in the foreseeable future.

Since the ACA was passed, it is predicted to expand health insurance to more than 25 million individuals;