preview

The Affordable Care Act Case Analysis

Good Essays

Let’s face it, the healthcare system in the U.S. is broken. The passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA or Obamacare) in 2010, was designed to “fix” the issues and provide access to health insurance for 30 million uninsured and underinsured Americans. This has been the biggest move in healthcare since establishing Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 (Moncrieff & Lee, 2011). My stance on the ACA is pretty bland, at best. As with most things, there are pros and cons in every situation. The main cons I have with the ACA are the costs associated with funding. Funding for the ACA will be provided by cuts to Medicare, as well as, tax increases (Hall & Lord, 2014). Medicare has been struggling for years with funding, so by cutting roughly $500 …show more content…

When the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010, it required participation by virtually all U.S. citizens (Cooper & Gardner, 2016). The goal was to expand health care to 30 million uninsured or underinsured Americans and lower health care spending. The root cause for the ACA was rising costs of health care costs due to new drugs and pharmaceuticals and technology advancements. The cost of health care is a major factor in the number of Americans without coverage (Popescu, 2015). The passing the ACA into law was intended to drive down these health care costs. Like I mentioned above, there are pros and cons of the law. The pros are improved access to health care, affordable and fair premiums with no lifetime limits, and coverage of preventive costs. This was especially important to lower income families. One con was the way the government planned to fund the ACA (Hall & Lord, 2014). There would be new taxes, aimed specifically at upper-class Americans. Also, the lack of providers and physicians that accepted the marketplace coverage. This forced some people to change their primary care physicians and establish new care. Also, insurance companies were forced to cover sick individuals. This drove up premiums for all individuals to cover those who used the system more frequently. The ACA drew opposition from the American Medical Association as physicians did not want to be Federal employees.

Get Access