Healthcare reform has come to the United States. It is called The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In its wake, healthcare in the United States will radically change. The United States trails as one of the last industrialized countries in the world to construct a national health plan. Israel has a national health plan that covers all its citizens that has been in place since 1995. There are some similarities with the proposed US health plan, but many differences. Both of these will be briefly covered in this discussion post.
I have been a licensed insurance agent for over 20 years. I was number one in the State for Small Group Sales when Blue Cross still existed. I enjoyed my job, the pay and providing affordable coverage to my customers for years. However, that changed when health care costs continued to sky rocket and pre existing became the name of the game. I knew reform was coming and reform was needed. Now, some 15 years after I lost my job when Blue Cross closed offices, reform is here. It is officially called The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, but almost everyone calls its Obamacare (Sorrell, 2012). It just rolled out and is in its infantile stage. It is estimated to provide some 30 million of the 47 million now uninsured Americans with coverage (Sorrell, 2012).
The Affordable Care Act makes health insurance a requirement for all Americans to purchase. It eliminates all pre-existing condition underwriting and offers a
The U.S. is an industrialized nation that continues to be behind on providing health care coverage to all citizens. However, the German health care system came up with a plan that ensured all citizens are provided with some form of health care coverage; nevertheless, the U.S. continues to dispute health care reform and how to provide coverage to all citizens. “Health spending per capita in the United States is much higher than in other countries – at least $2,535 dollars, or 51%, higher than Norway, the next largest per capita spender. Furthermore, the United States spends nearly double the average $3,923 for the 15 countries ("Health Care Cost," 2011, table 1)”.
On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA), a law put in place to provide comprehensive health insurance reforms that allowed Americans to have access to affordable health insurance options. The Affordable Care Act seeks to make health care more affordable, secure, accessible and of a higher quality for the millions of Americans who were previously uninsured, or who had insurance that didn’t provide them adequate coverage and security.
In 2010 President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA) into law. ACA is pivotal legislation that had rippling effects throughout the healthcare system. The Affordable Care Act was drafted with the sole intention of expanding healthcare access across the country. Under the ACA, Americans are now mandated to purchase health insurance or face a penalty. Americans without insurance are able to get coverage by purchasing through the insurance exchange or by qualifying for Medicaid. The poverty level was raised for Medicaid and new provisions allowed single men to also qualify. Anyone that does not qualify for Medicaid would need to purchase a plan on the insurance exchange and various subsidies are available based on income level.
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) reform law is set up by the federal government to ensure that all Americans have access to quality and affordable care, protect people with pre-existing condition from being denied by insurance companies and to control healthcare cost
The Affordable Care Act requires every citizen to have health insurance, therefore no matter what; health care costs are cheaper when receiving care (The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation Headquarters, 2013). The Affordable Care Act mainly focuses on helping the funding for individuals and ensures that everyone has the assistance that they need. Through this act, small businesses and individuals have the opportunity to compare their plans and determine if they should apply for financial assistance. These health care plans are required through the Affordable Care Act to cover ten of the essential health care benefits and also require plans to provide their patients with no-cost preventive benefits; therefore no insurance has the opportunity not to cover
The Affordable Care Act is a law that was enacted on the 23rd of March 2010. Regardless of the fact that it was put into place in 2010, there are still numerous aspects of the law being debated today. The law has several provisions that are expected to take effect between the year of 2010 and 2020 (Reid, 2012). Among the significant reforms in the law includes a clause prohibiting insurers from refusing people coverage due to some preexisting conditions. In addition, these companies should offer the same price for all clients who are in the same geographical location and are the same age. Another reform was that families that are in the poverty line should receive federal subsidies if they decide to buy insurance through an exchange. The government also created minimum standards for insurance policies. The government also established health insurance exchanges as platforms for comparison of different policies. The Affordable Care Act also has an individual mandate
The Affordable Care Act (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act), commonly called "Obamacare," is a federal statute that was signed into law in March of 2010 (PDF, n.d.; Van de Water, 2011). It basically requires the vast majority of people in the United States who do not have insurance coverage to acquire that coverage or face penalties. People who already have insurance through their employers or on their own will not be asked to change companies. Additionally, anyone who is on federally-funded insurance such as Medicaid or Medicare and still qualifies for those programs will not be removed from their insurance. They will still be covered and protected. In order to find out more about the Act and really understand its main points and principles, however, it is very important to be aware of how it became a law and any changes that have taken place to it from its inception all the way through where it is today. Only then can a person have a clear understanding of the Act and form an opinion as to the value it may (or may not) provide to the American public. There is still much speculation and a great deal of misunderstanding about the Act and what it involves.
The Affordable Care act helps offer Americans a number of new benefits,right, and protections in regards to their health care in many ways. It allows shoppers to compare their health care plans and count them as a minimum essential coverage, which also includes all new benefits, rights, and protections. Small families, individuals, and small
On March 23, 2010 President Barack Obama put into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It is commonly referred to as the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare. The primary goal of the Affordable Care Act was to increase health insurance quality and affordability for the American people. The law introduces new rules for insurance companies requiring acceptance for all who apply. It requires that the same insurance premiums be charged regardless of race, sex, or pre-existing conditions. Initially the amount of people who did not have insurance dropped from 16% to 18%. The affordable care act has also created health insurance exchanges or the health insurance marketplaces. Health insurance exchanges or marketplaces are government regulated websites or designated signup offices where individuals can purchase insurance. However, one of the most important mandate that is included under the affordable care act is the requirement for the individual to buy insurance or pay a penalty. This has been a problem to most Americans and the reason it was almost deemed unconstitutional.
The Affordable Care Act, in its time, has helped many uninsured Americans to obtain health insurance by giving them guaranteed coverage. About 20 million Americans, based on the statistics from the New York Times’s article titled “Fact Check: Trump’s Critiques of the Affordable Care Act.”, have obtained health insurance through the ACA. Dropping the uninsured rate to 11 percent by 2013 (Qiu 2017). Americans, through the ACA, were able to get health insurance even if they got sick, which inevitably happens to many. This put insurers in a place where they cannot deny coverage to people who have preexisting conditions, or their health history. Other main points that are included in Former President Obama’s Affordable Care Act is that one, it was given as an individual mandate that all U.S. Citizens and legal residents must enroll for qualifying health care or get penalized for not signing up for insurance at all. Making the fact that getting health care is mandatory is a good way to lower the insured rates and save many Americans money when the next unexpected hospital visits or illnesses come up. Another thing is that the ACA has also expanded medicaid to all non-Medicaid eligible individuals that are under the age 65 and making medicaid more federal funded based rather than a state issue. Thus helping those who could not afford
In today’s day and age, American households can all agree that health insurance is not a luxury, but a necessity. Without it, costs of emergency room visits and prescription medicines can be financially devastating. However, in the past many families and individuals have taken the risk of not being insured due to the high cost of the insurance itself. To attempt to reform this unfair system, the Obama administration signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2010. The law, coined “Obamacare,” has received much opposition due to its expansion government programs and increase in spending. It brings to question how much the government should be involved in an area that for the majority of America’s history, has been
The purpose of the Affordable Care Act is to make health insurance more affordable for those who may not have health insurance or those who do, but have little to no coverage. While a vast majority of Americans had health insurance previously to the enacting of ACA, the new law was for people who did not want to buy it or could not afford insurance (Clark J.,
Basic changes were needed in the way Americans got health coverage. Trying to figure out what it was going to cost them starting in 2014, when major parts of the Affordable Care Act, also known as “Obamacare”, went into effect was the challenge. The four main ways Americans experience healthcare once the Health Reform Law was fully in effect were coverage by an employer, the government, buy it themselves or have none. About half of Americans get insurance through their jobs. About one third through the government like Medicare and Medicaid. About one in ten purchase insurance themselves. And still another 30 million, just under one in ten, no coverage at all.
The implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), popularly known as “Obamacare”, has drastically altered healthcare in America. The goal of this act was to give Americans access to affordable, high quality insurance while simultaneously decreasing overall healthcare spending. The ACA had intended to maximize health care coverage throughout the United States, but this lofty ambition resulted in staggeringly huge financial and human costs.
The affordable Care Act implemented in March of 2010 by president Obama reform the way health care was previously run in the United States. The law went into effect, which allowed many Americans who did not currently have insurance and health care coverage to the ability to purchase coverage and access to health care. “ According to the CDC “ the affordable care act of 2010 is designed to provide access to coverage for previously uninsured Americans “ Center of Disease Control (2014).