Millions of Americans are constantly reminded of the horrible effects of the Affordable Care Act anytime medical care is required. I have witnessed many families and individuals struggle to cover the extra financial responsibility imposed upon them: Susan Gardiner, a fellow Kroger employee, states her health insurance costs have significantly increased following the approval of the Affordable Care Act; consequently, Ms. Gardiner routinely experiences financial hardships as she requires frequent medical care. Americans simply cannot cope with the Affordable Care Act’s inherent attribute of exorbitant insurance premiums and deductibles. In an attempt to decrease medical costs for an impoverished minority of Americans, the Affordable Care Act, …show more content…
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, there are currently 3 million Americans in the coverage gap; there is a substantial number of Americans the Act does not address. The Affordable Care Act, as with any major legislative action, has its advocates and viewpoints. Supporters of the Affordable Care Act point out that the Act allowed Americans, who would not be able to afford health insurance without federal assistance, to purchase affordable health insurance. Through coercion, the Act has decreased the number of uninsured; nonetheless, a minority of Americans have benefitted from federal subsidies whilst the vast majority of Americans have endured a great deal of suffering. Another alleged consequence of the Affordable Care Act is the improved quality of care-- a major fallacy. The Act has effectively decreased the quality of health care as a result of its compensatory cuts to medical professionals; decreasing funding will undoubtedly destroy the quality of medical practices. Fox New’s Ali Meyer conducted a survey of medical professionals in which half agreed the Affordable Care Act has a negative impact on the medical profession, including reduced quality of …show more content…
The law that was intended to improve the status quo of health care has, in essence, caused a dangerous paradigm shift in health care costs. Fundamentally, the Affordable Care Act is a failed attempt to reduce health care costs in the United States. The Act was designed to increase affordability of health insurance for extremely low-income families; nevertheless, the Act exponentially increased health insurance costs for the majority of Americans. In America, majority rules-- why should health care be an
The accessibility to health care due to the Affordable Care Act has saved so many lives, more than we can count. Furthermore, every beneficial concept has cons attached to it. The Affordable Care Act was also the cause of many workers losing their employment-based
The Affordable Health Care Act, also known as “Obamacare”, is basically just Obama trying to make sure that the whole nation has insurance and if they do not have it by January 1, 2014, they will be penalized with a fine. To make insurance more affordable, many Americans are able to qualify for a subsidy that lowers the cost depending on age and income. Also, “Obamacare” made it impossible for insurers’ to discriminate, or charge higher rates, for anyone who has pre-existing conditions or for a certain gender. Medicare will also be easier to obtain due to requirement of insurance. This law was passed in the U.S. on March 23, 2010 by Congress and President Barack Obama.
Many people believe healthcare reform is a bad idea and that the government should stay away from healthcare. However, there are many other people who believe that it is a great thing that the government got involved, and created programs to register for mandatory health-care. In, “Healthcare Reform 101”, author Rick Panning discusses some of the main goals of the Affordable Healthcare Act, which are universality, financing, cost reduction, payment reform, quality and process improvement, prevention and wellness.
“Healthcare Reform 101,” written by Rick Panning (2014), is a wonderful article that describes, in an easy-to-understand language, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, signed into law March 23, 2010. The main goal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was to provide affordable, quality healthcare to Americans while simultaneously reducing some of the country’s economic problems. Two areas will be covered throughout this paper. The first section will include a summary of the major points and highlights of Panning’s (2014) article, including an introduction to the ACA, goals of the signed legislation, provided coverage, and downfalls of the current healthcare system. The second part will be comprised of a professional
The Affordable Care Act, (ACA) often referred to as Obamacare, was signed into law March 23rd, 2010 and has quickly become a nightmare to millions of citizens nationwide. While there were fortunate people who benefited from the heavily subsidized and affordable healthcare that was not readily available before ACA was passed, many more people found that their once affordable healthcare was no longer an option due to new ACA requirements (how so?). ACA was designed to extend insurance benefits to roughly 30 million uninsured Americans. The Obama administration aimed to extend Medicaid and provide federal subsidies so lower and middle-class Americans could afford to buy private insurance. This act alone forced millions of Americans out of their
On March 23, 2010, the President of the United States signed the “The Affordable Care Act” into law and the Supreme Court rendered a final decision to uphold this new law on June 28, 2012. (About the Law, 2015) But the biggest question regarding this law, is whether it is constitutional or not. "The Act establishes the basic legal protections that until now have been absent: a near-universal guarantee of access to affordable health insurance coverage, from birth through retirement. When fully implemented, the Act will cut the number of uninsured Americans by more than half. The law will result in health insurance coverage for about 94% of the American population, reducing the uninsured by 31 million people, and increasing Medicaid enrollment
The Affordable Care Act: The Good, The Bad, and The Confusing Healthcare is important. Without it, people would not have the adequate means to acquire treatment for illness or injury. However, the United States does not have universal health care for everyone, nor is means of gaining healthcare affordable for all. To try to solve this problem, President Obama began working on healthcare reform almost immediately after assuming office in 2009.
A Second Look at the Affordable Care Act David E. Mann, ABA American Military University POLS210 Abstract Since the passing of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), twenty-eight states have either filed joint or individual lawsuits to strike down the PPACA. This document will examine a few key elements that the President of the United States must take into consideration when reviewing the act and moving forward to either ratify the act, replace the act, or leave the act as it is. Topics that will be presented will include; the current issues being debated, two competing thoughts on how to fix the ACA, an evaluation of the preferred solution, and finally the responsibility of each level of government. Patient
The American health system has been controlled by private, all-for-profit companies who couldn’t care less about the health of a human, but are more worried about maximizing their dollars. If the Affordable Care Act is repealed, or “done away with”, tens of millions of Americans will be without adequate health insurance. This is exactly what Americans
Despite extensive statistics and research proving what's wrong with healthcare in the States, political leaders cannot get past futile disagreements over what to do to enact change. Many of the decision-makers in this country have no idea of the effect that a broken healthcare system poses on underprivileged Americans. Ridiculous costs, low coverage, and corporate greed are a few reasons why healthcare in the United States is so disastrous. Issues like these cause the standard of living to be increasingly difficult for everyone, especially minorities and people of lower economic status. Many individuals have attempted to create solutions to avoid the financial problems that healthcare causes through the means of speeches and literature.
Before the Affordable Care Act was put into work, over 45 million Americans were uninsured. The Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, was then made to help those who were uninsured. It allowed people with financial struggles with the same opportunity as everyone else to have a healthcare plan. Even though the law was passed in 2010, it took a full year of back and forth to get it passed in the Senate. Obamacare may help you get coverage, but charge you an annual fee if you don’t have one.
46.8 million Americans were reported as uninsured in 2013, which equivocates to one sixth of the population. Those without insurance have revealed that they risk “more problems getting care, are diagnosed at later disease stages, and get less therapeutic care” (National Health Care Disparities Report) and those insured risk losing their insurance. Inadequately covered citizens are often working-class individuals who simply cannot receive insurance due to uncontrollable inconveniences and therefore jeopardize having medical coverage. In these instances, Americans have a chance of being diagnosed with diseases that they had no opportunity to prevent or could not diagnose them at an early stage of the illness. Patients have suffered unnecessarily due to lack of health care, and “18,000 Americans die every year because they don't have health insurance” (PNHP).
The ACA has been making advances in decreasing the amount of uninsured Americans and trying to minimize the amount of healthcare disparities. With the advances throughout history there is still a long way to
Many Americans were led to believe that the introduction of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2009 would put an end to disparities in health care access. While it did improve the situation for a small percentage of the population there are still many Americans who lack access to good quality health care. Health care access in America is determined by money and those in lower socioeconomic groups frequently tend to miss out on adequate care. In a recent health care report by the national health research foundation Kaiser Family Foundation, it was noted “health care disparities remain a persistent problem in the United States, leading to certain groups being at higher risk of being uninsured, having limited access to care, and experiencing poorer quality of care” (Kaiser Family Foundation). The current health care