Marketplace Enrollees with Unpredictable Incomes Could Face Bigger Penalties Under House Reconciliation Bill Provision May 19, 2025 Issue Brief This 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.
How Will the 2025 Budget Reconciliation Affect the ACA, Medicaid, and the Uninsured Rate? May 13, 2025 Blog This analysis details the number of people who would become uninsured from policy changes in the ACA Marketplace and Medicaid. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that, taken together, these changes will result in at least 13.7 million more uninsured people in the year 2034 than would otherwise be the case.
ACA Preventive Services Are Back at the Supreme Court: Kennedy v. Braidwood April 15, 2025 Issue Brief This brief provides an overview of the most recent ACA case under review at the Supreme Court (Kennedy v. Braidwood Management) and discusses the implications of the potential rulings by the high court.
Navigating the Maze: A Look at Patient Cost-Sharing Complexities and Consumer Protections March 28, 2025 Issue Brief This brief focuses on consumers’ understanding of health insurance costs and examines existing federal protections that seek to address barriers to understanding the cost of coverage and care, such as price transparency, self-service price estimator tools, and simplifying cost-sharing designs.
New Rule Proposes Changes to ACA Coverage of Gender-Affirming Care, Potentially Increasing Costs for Consumers March 24, 2025 Issue Brief This brief examines a proposed rule that seeks to change how ACA plans would cover gender affirming care services. If finalized the rule could lead insurers to drop coverage or shift costs to individuals and states, making access to gender affirming care more difficult.
A Backlash Against Health Insurers, Redux March 13, 2025 Perspective In this JAMA Health Forum post, Executive Vice President Larry Levitt recalls the mid-1990s’ public backlash against Health Maintenance Organizations (commonly known as HMOs) – all of which preceded the recent outpouring of health insurance concerns – as well as how consumer protections against coverage restrictions have evolved and fallen short.
Navigating the Maze: A Look at Health Insurance Complexities and Consumer Protections March 3, 2025 Issue Brief This brief discusses how consumers understand what their insurance covers, what to do when coverage for care is denied, and what protections exist to ensure that information is available and coverage determinations are fair, accurate, and timely.
Challenges with Effective Price Transparency Analyses February 25, 2025 Issue Brief Promoting price transparency in health care is a policy approach with bi-partisan support in Congress and the public at large. This analysis examines the vast troves of price transparency data that payers are required and finds unlikely prices, inconsistencies, and other oddities that pose major challenges for efforts to use it to promote competition and drive down prices.
Congressional District Interactive Map: How Much Will ACA Premium Payments Rise if Enhanced Subsidies Expire? February 3, 2025 Issue Brief This analysis and interactive map illustrate how much more enrollees in Affordable Care Act (ACA) Marketplace plans would pay in premiums at the congressional district level if the enhanced subsidies were to expire in 2026 as under current law. The tool presents scenarios for an older couple who would lose subsidy eligibility due to their income level and for a single person with a $31,000 income. It also presents net average premium payment increases in each district in states that use Healthcare.gov.