Pros And Cons Of The Affordable Care Act

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“And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.”, said Barack Obama. Healthcare has been implemented in America since the the 1900’s, stemming from President Lyndon B. Johnson’s domestic program, The Great Society. This plan included Medicaid, a program which helped low-income families out with medical costs and Medicare, a insurance program that helped American citizens that were 65+ years old. In 1985, The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 added onto the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 in order to give employees some more options of retaining …show more content…
The Affordable Care Act is meant to improve both the public and private aspects of insurance systems. Ever since this act was enacted, there have been both positive and negative aspects. The American system for healthcare has come a long way since then. In 2008, one in every set of seven people did not have healthcare coverage . The ACA was made in order to make sure as many people as possible were insured and that healthcare costs should decrease with time . The statistics have proven that ACA works as “The ACA has succeeded in sharply increasing insurance coverage. Since the ACA became law, the uninsured rate has declined by 43%, from 16.0% in 2010 to 9.1% in 2015, with most of that decline occurring after the law’s main coverage provisions took effect in 2014 . The number of uninsured individuals in the United States has declined from 49 million in 2010 to 29 million in 2015. ” This decreased in uninsured individuals is one of the most drastic changes since the Medicare and Medicaid was created. This health care reform has positively impacted the economy as the increased number of newly insured people caused lower premiums and health insurances companies stated how there was profit being made since the first quarter of 2011 because of the specific provisions included in the Affordable Care Act. According to the Kaiser survey, statistics showed that 46% more of small …show more content…
The act being implemented by President forces people to obtain their own health insurance and if they aren’t covered by a government connected program, they would be risking punishment . There also may be possible changes for Medicare and Medicaid in terms of “instituting premiums for Medicaid beneficiaries, tightening standards for eligibility, and having some part of the Medicaid population purchasing coverage on exchanges” . President Donald Trump is planning on implementing the “American Patients First” Plan in which he states will apparently decrease the cost of drugs. The Trump administration has also taken steps in order to decrease the effectiveness of Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act, by loosening regulations on short term insurance . Trump’s administration faces many oppositions ranging from hospital groups to health insurance companies, as Trump wants to change Medicaid as we know it

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