The independent source for health policy research, polling, and news.
KFF’s policy research provides facts and analysis on a wide range of policy issues and public programs.
KFF designs, conducts and analyzes original public opinion and survey research on Americans’ attitudes, knowledge, and experiences with the health care system to help amplify the public’s voice in major national debates.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the organization’s core operating programs.
Health Policy 101 is a comprehensive guide covering fundamental aspects of U.S. health policy and programs, including Medicare, Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, employer-sponsored insurance, the uninsured population, health care costs and affordability, women's health issues, and health care politics. The Health Care Costs and Affordability chapter explores trends in health care costs in the U.S. and the factors that contribute to this spending. It also examines how health care spending varies across the population, the impact of costs on care affordability and individuals' overall financial vulnerability.
A new Kaiser Family Foundation analysis finds that average annual out-of-pocket prescription drug spending for workers and family members decreased from a recent high of $167 in 2009 to $144 in 2014.
This month’s Kaiser Health Tracking Poll examines top issues to voters in the presidential election and finds that while health care ranks low, voters report being aware of the differences between Clinton’s and Trump’s health care proposals. Findings also include a look at which health care issues the next president and Congress should prioritize, the future of the Affordable Care Act, as well as Americans’ views on the creation of a public health insurance option.
A new Kaiser Family Foundation analysis estimates that 6.3 million people -- 23 percent of 27.4 million non-elderly adults with a gap of several months in insurance coverage in 2015 – could potentially face higher premiums under the House’s American Health Care Act (AHCA), due to pre-existing health conditions.
The American Health Care Act (AHCA), which has passed the House of Representatives, contains a controversial provision that would allow states to waive community rating in the individual insurance market. In this brief we estimate the number of people with pre-existing conditions who might be affected by such a policy.
This brief describes Medicaid’s role for nearly 7 million nonelderly adults with disabilities living in the community to help inform the debate about the American Health Care Act’s proposals to end enhanced federal funding under the ACA and reduce federal Medicaid funding under a per capita cap.
The latest Kaiser Health Tracking Poll examines the public’s early attitudes towards the House Republican plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act and finds that more expect the new plan will make things worse rather than better when it comes to the number of people with coverage and costs for those buying insurance on their own. The survey also measures public support for continuing current federal Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood, gauges the importance of various ACA provisions for women’s and children’s health, and revisits the public's knowledge on key provisions included in the health care law.
The debate about the future of the Affordable Care Act and its individual insurance marketplaces may be taking the focus off the affordability challenges facing the broader population, most of whom get their health coverage through employers, Medicare or Medicaid.
In anticipation of upcoming Democratic presidential debates, this poll finds that Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say that health care is a top issue they want to hear candidates talk about. When asked to say in their own words what health care issue they specifically want to hear about, affordability emerges as one of the top issues. The poll also probes the public about different possible implications of implementing a Medicare-for-all plan and finds that most Americans don't realize how dramatically such a proposal would revamp the current health care system.
KFF's Tricia Neuman's testimony before the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means on June 12, 2019 describes a range of proposals to broaden health insurance coverage and make health care more affordable, the similarities and differences among them, and the policy choices and trade-offs that could have significant implications for coverage and costs.
In this Axios column, Drew Altman shows that employer coverage for lower wage workers is much worse than ACA marketplace coverage for similar populations. It’s a bigger problem we need to talk about more, he says.
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