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Democrats Hold a Nearly 2-to-1 Advantage Over Republicans on Handling the Cost of Health Care

Poll: Cost of Health Care and Gas Top Voters’ Midterm Concerns; Democrats Hold Significant Advantage on Health Care Costs and Cost of Living 

With the 2026 midterms about a month away, health care costs remain tied with gas as voters’ top midterm concerns and the Democrats hold a clear edge over the Republicans Party on who voters trust to handle many top electoral issues, including the cost of health care and the cost of living. Two-thirds of U.S. adults now favor Medicare-for-all, a new high in KFF Polling, but support shifts when competing claims from critics and proponents are heard.

New and noteworthy

Americans’ Challenges with Health Care Costs

This data note reviews our recent polling data that finds that many Americans struggle to afford many aspects of health care, including disproportionate shares of uninsured adults, Black and Hispanic adults and those with lower incomes.

Health System Tracker

Is This A Healthcare Economy?

Health care employment has grown faster than other sectors of the economy, with jobs in physician offices, hospitals, outpatient care centers, home health, and other settings increasing over the past year even as the rest of the job market plateaued. 

Cumulative percent change in health sector and non-health sector employment, January 1990 - August 2026

What Are the Recent Trends in Health Sector Employment

Health care employment continues to grow even as hiring across other sectors has plateaued. The health sector added nearly 379,000 jobs over the past year, a 2% increase, compared with just 0.2% growth in other non-farm employment, with outpatient care among the fastest-growing health care settings.

How TrumpRx Brand-Name Drug Prices Compare

TrumpRx prices for brand-name drugs are about as likely to be higher as lower compared to average prices in other wealthy countries, according to an analysis that compares 32 brand-name drugs.

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  • Rate Review: Spotlight on State Efforts to Make Health Insurance More Affordable

    Other Post

    The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act creates a new federal role to examine “unreasonable increases” in the premiums charged for certain individual and small group health plans. Under the health reform law, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will work with state insurance departments to conduct an annual review of unreasonable rate increases, and insurers must provide justification for such increases to HHS and to the public via their websites. The…

  • Trends in Health Insurance Coverage in the U.S.: The Impact of the Economy

    Event Date:
    Event

    The rising number of uninsured, who they are and how they might obtain health insurance coverage were much debated during the consideration and passage of health reform in the last year. Panelists at this briefing examined the recent health insurance coverage numbers and trends, what they mean, who the newly uninsured are and the impact of being uninsured. They also reviewed what states are doing during the current economic climate and how they are preparing…

  • Pulling It Together: What Conservatives Won In Health Reform (And Don’t Seem to Know It)

    Perspective

    Conservatives obviously don't like what they call "Obamacare" because they think it expands the role of government too much and spends too much money.  But ironically, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) actually promotes -- though not explicitly -- something that has been a fundamental objective of conservatives in health care for years: high-deductible health plans with more "skin in the game." In a new study we just released, we commissioned three different actuarial consulting firms…

  • Accountable Care Organizations: A New Paradigm for Health Care Delivery?

    Event Date:
    Event

    The health reform law of 2010 authorizes Medicare, beginning next year, to contract with accountable care organizations (ACOs) in a Medicare Shared Savings Program. ACOs provide financial incentives to improve the coordination and quality of care for Medicare beneficiaries, while reducing costs. But providers have raised red flags, saying the arrangements are burdensome and too hard to achieve. This briefing addresses questions raised by the law and the subsequent regulation implementing ACOs, including: How will…

  • Preventing Chronic Disease: The New Public Health

    Event Date:
    Event

    There is a groundswell of activity in local communities to support healthier lifestyles and help people make long-lasting and sustainable changes that can reduce their risk for chronic diseases. A number of provisions in the health reform law are aimed directly at improving population health by addressing conditions where Americans live, learn, work, and play. Public health agencies across the nation are involved in promoting healthy life styles in their communities and the U.S. Department…

  • Pulling It Together: Writing Regulations

    Perspective

    Not since Geraldo Rivera revealed the secret contents of Al Capone's vault on national TV in the mid-80s, or more recently, sports fans awaited the LeBron James "decision" about where he would play next, have we so anxiously awaited anything as much as the draft health exchange regulations just published by HHS. Well, okay, I exaggerate for effect, but the regulations on health insurance exchanges were anxiously awaited by the health policy community. The hallmark…

  • Congressional Testimony on Expanding Health Care Coverage

    Event Date:
    Event

    On May 5, 2009, the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance held a roundtable discussion on health-care coverage issues as part of its health reform efforts. Diane Rowland, the Foundation's Executive Vice President and Executive Director of the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, and Gary Claxton, Foundation Vice President and Director of the Health Care Marketplace Project, participated in the discussion and prepared written testimony at the committee's request. Testimony of Diane Rowland (.pdf)…

  • The Working Uninsured in California and the US

    Issue Brief

    This issue brief, prepared by Linda Blumberg and Len Nichols of the Urban Institute, examines the factors contributing to the disproportionately high rates of uninsurance among California's workers compared to the U.S. The report looks at differences in coverage by race and ethnicity, and by citizenship status, and also examines offer and take-up rates for employer health insurance among California's workers. Issue Brief

  • Trends and Indicators in the Changing Health Care Marketplace 2002

    Report

    This chartbook provides information on key trends in the health care marketplace including health spending, the structure of the health care marketplace, and health plan and provider relationships. It highlights data on health plan enrollment, premiums, and benefits, and the implications of health market trends for consumers and the safety net. Chartbook (.pdf)

  • A Study of Media Coverage of Health Policy 1997-2000

    Poll Finding

    The debate over President Clinton's national health care reform plan put health care policy at the forefront of the national agenda in 1993 and 1994. After the end of that debate, it remained to be seen whether or not health policy would hold the media's and the public s interest to the same degree. To help answer that and other questions, a comprehensive study of health policy media coverage from 1997 through 2000 - focusing…