Another important aspect of the Senate effort in D.C. to eradicate the Affordable Care Act involves what it would cost and what would it mean to people who have health insurance coverage.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) on Wednesday released their latest estimate of what would result from an ACA repeal.
CBO and JCT wrote that passing a repeal of the ACA would decrease deficits by $473 billion over the 2017 to 2026 period. As for coverage and premiums, CBO and JCT staff wrote this:
• “The number of people who are uninsured would increase by 17 million in 2018, compared with the number under current law. That number would increase to 27 million in 2020, after the elimination of the ACA’s expansion of eligibility for Medicaid and the elimination of subsidies for insurance purchased through the marketplaces established by the ACA, and then to 32 million in 2026.
• “Average premiums in the nongroup market (for individual policies purchased through the marketplaces or directly from insurers) would increase by roughly 25 percent—relative to projections under current law—in 2018. The increase would reach about 50 percent in 2020, and premiums would about double by 2026.
"In CBO and JCT’s estimation, under this legislation, about half of the nation’s population would live in areas having no insurer participating in the nongroup market in 2020 because of downward pressure on enrollment and upward pressure on premiums. That share would continue to increase, extending to about three-quarters of the population by 2026.”