Policy Uncertainty is Creating Challenges for ACA Marketplace Insurers
Until Congress passes the reconciliation bill, Marketplace insurers will face uncertainty regarding the regulatory landscape and may find it difficult to set premiums for 2026.
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Which States Might have to Reduce Provider Taxes Under the Senate Reconciliation Bill?
Policy WatchIf Congress passes the reconciliation bill with the Finance Committee provision, 22 states might have to reduce their provider taxes on either hospitals or managed care organizations, cutting a key source of state Medicaid funding in those states. This policy watch explains how the Finance Committee provision would reduce states’ Medicaid spending, and the implications for expansion states.
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Clues From Polling About How Opinion Might Change If We Had More Informed Health Policy Debate?
From Drew AltmanIn a new column, Dr. Drew Altman, KFF’s President and CEO, discusses the limits of polling on policy, and what we have learned over more than 30 years of polling about how giving people more information and arraying tradeoffs can change opinion, including on the health policy changes and funding cuts in the current reconciliation bill.
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Making the Marketplaces Great Again?
From Drew AltmanIn his latest column, President and CEO Drew Altman discusses how, with nearly half, or about 10 million MAGA supporters and Republicans receiving coverage through the ACA Marketplaces, the policy changes and cuts being considered by Republicans to the Marketplaces will directly affect their own voters. Altman writes: "Republicans are no longer interested in repealing the ACA but seem comfortable shrinking it significantly if they can, so long as they don’t touch protections for pre-existing conditions, which is now a political third rail."
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An Additional 8.2 Million People are Expected to Be Uninsured from Changes in the ACA Marketplaces
Quick TakeACA Marketplace changes are technical and numerous but consequential. While more attention has been focused on cuts to Medicaid, upcoming changes to the ACA Marketplaces could lead to just as many people losing health insurance coverage.
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Early Indications of the Impact of the Enhanced Premium Tax Credit Expiration on 2026 Marketplace Premiums
Issue BriefEvery summer, health insurers submit rate filings to state regulators detailing expectations and justifying premium rate changes for ACA-regulated health plans for the coming year. With the enhanced premium tax credits set to expire at the end of 2025, consumers can expect increases in how much they pay for coverage.
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Marketplace Enrollees with Unpredictable Incomes Could Face Bigger Penalties Under House Reconciliation Bill Provision
Issue BriefThis analysis illustrates how provisions included in the House budget reconciliation bill could expose Marketplace enrollees with unpredictable incomes to higher penalties when filing taxes if they underestimate their incomes. About one in four potential Marketplace shoppers had incomes that varied at least 20 percent from the beginning to the end of the year.
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Final Budget Resolution Codifies Unreconciled Differences on Medicaid Cuts in House and Senate Reconciliation
Quick TakeThe budget resolution is unusual because it establishes different tracks for reconciliation in each chamber: House committees are instructed to increase deficits by $2.3 trillion, with major cuts to Medicaid; and Senate committees are instructed to increase deficits by what amounts to $5.8 trillion, without clear implications for Medicaid cuts.
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Putting $880 Billion in Potential Federal Medicaid Cuts in Context of State Budgets and Coverage
Issue BriefThis brief explores the magnitude of the potential federal Medicaid funding cuts under the House budget resolution. This brief puts the $880 billion in cuts in context by comparing the size of the cuts to states’ tax revenues, spending on education, and the number of Medicaid enrollees covered for that cost.
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What Does the Federal Government Spend on Health Care?
Issue BriefAs Congressional Republicans and President Trump search for trillions of dollars in cuts to mandatory federal spending that could help offset the cost of extending expiring tax cuts, this brief analyzes current support from the federal government for health programs and services, including both spending and tax subsidies as context for those federal budget discussions.