Home Affordable Care Act Topics

Affordable Care Act

The ACA MarketplaceS

POLLING on the ACA

Tracking the Public’s Views on the ACA

While overall opinion of the Affordable Care Act has been more favorable than unfavorable since 2017, there remain deep partisan divides. See how public opinion on the ACA has changed from the inception of the law to the present. This interactive tool highlights key moments when views shifted and trends based on party identification, income, age, gender, and race/ethnicity.

Latest News

More KFF Health News

Subscribe to KFF Emails

Choose which emails are best for you.
Sign up here

View the Latest: Affordable Care Act

Filter

List Grid

2,721 - 2,730 of 2,775 Results

  • Pulling it Together from Drew Altman: Multiple Agendas for Controlling Health Care Costs

    Perspective

    In what would be a domestic policy trifecta, we may be headed for interconnected big debates about economic recovery, entitlement programs and health reform. A core issue in the entitlement and health reform debates is the problem of rising health care costs. President Obama, now apparently fully briefed on the economic, budget and health reform realities he faces, is talking conspicuously about hard choices that may lie ahead. In a short period of time the…

  • Window of Opportunity?

    From Drew Altman

    Beginning this Spring, between expected approval of an economic stimulus package and the start of campaigning for the midterm election, there will be a rare window of opportunity for passage of major health reform legislation. History suggests that momentum can be lost if policymakers do not move quickly to seize these rare openings when they occur. There is an opportunity now because the nation has a popular new president with political capital to burn who…

  • Pulling It Together: The “R” Word Is Back

    Perspective

    Longer ago than I care to admit, I got my start in health policy at M.I.T. when I wrote a book about health care regulation. The book was about a long forgotten attempt to rationalize the health care system through an elaborate health planning program set up in the seventies under the National Health Planning and Resources Development Act. It established a system of federal, state and regional planning bodies to control health care costs by limiting the supply of…

  • Primers on Key Health Care Topics and Programs

    Issue Brief

    The Kaiser Family Foundation maintains a number of primers providing overviews of key health care programs and issues. Written by Foundation staff, each primer provides key data and information that helps illustrate the topic and its relevance for the nation's health care system. Medicaid: A Primer Medicare: A Primer The Uninsured: A Primer Health Care Costs: A Primer How Private Health Coverage Works: A Primer Mental Health Financing in the United States: A Primer The…

  • Health Coverage in a Period of Rising Unemployment

    Issue Brief

    This policy brief reviews the public and private options available to help people maintain coverage if they become unemployed during a downturn and cannot get employer-sponsored coverage through a spouse. Specifically, it examines COBRA, non-group insurance and Medicaid. And it explains why, despite such options, more people will become uninsured as unemployment rises. Recent analysis predicts that each 1 percentage point increase in unemployment will lead to 1.1 million more uninsured adults. Issue Brief (.pdf)

  • Approaches to Covering the Uninsured: A Guide

    Issue Brief

    The guide explains the key strategies for expanding coverage to the nation's 45 million uninsured people and explains and how different policy options can be combined to form comprehensive reform proposals. It organizes the various policy strategies under four overall approaches: strengthening current coverage arrangements, improving the affordability of coverage, improving the availability of coverage and changing the tax treatment and financing of health insurance. Guide (.pdf)

  • Pulling It Together: Keeping the Health Reform Coalition Together

    Perspective

    We could be headed for a new schism in the debate about health reform. Not the familiar gulf between advocates of the market and government, or the predictable one between deficit hawks and spenders, but a new one that crosses traditional partisan and ideological lines between advocates of long-term reform of the health care delivery system, and immediate help for the uninsured and insured struggling with health care costs.  This new rift is most likely to develop if tight money and a crowded agenda…

  • Health Coverage in an Economic Downturn: Impact of Tight Budgets on Families and States

    Fact Sheet

    The economic downturn has strained family finances and prompted some Americans to cut back on medications and forgo preventive care and visits to the doctor. At the same time, the downturn has triggered declines in tax revenue that inhibit states’ ability to meet rising Medicaid program costs as enrollment spikes during economic hard times. Many states are expected to struggle to close budget gaps despite moves by Congress and the Obama Administration to temporarily boost…

  • The Fraying Link Between Work and Health Insurance: Trends in Employer-Sponsored Insurance for Employees, 2000-2007

    Report

    This analysis shows that employer-sponsored coverage began declining after 2000 due to an economic downturn that saw rising unemployment, declining family incomes and more workers moving into temporary work, part-time work and other employment arrangements where health benefits were not provided. Employer-sponsored coverage continued to decline after 2003 despite improvements in the economy and slower growth in health care costs. The decline in coverage was due both to falloffs in the share of employees with…

  • President Obama’s Campaign Position on Health Reform and Other Health Care Issues

    Issue Brief

    During the 2008 Presidential campaign now President Barack Obama announced a comprehensive health care reform proposal and laid out his positions on a number of other key health care issues. The two documents below summarize these campaign policies and positions. They were prepared by the Kaiser Family Foundation with the assistance of Health Policy Alternatives, Inc., and are based on information compiled from Obama's campaign Web site, speeches, campaign debates and news reports. They are…