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Affordability

  • Awakening the Force of Two-Generations’ (Children and their Parents) Coverage, Access and Affordability: Historic Gains Worth Celebrating in 2016

    Guest

    By Liane Wong, Dr.P.H. The David and Lucile Packard Foundation While there’s been an incredible amount of buzz around the release of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” this December, a less heralded moment in history was made at the end of 2015. But it’s history worth celebrating for our nation’s families and children, and one…

  • Half of the Uninsured are Eligible for ACA Coverage

    Guest

    by Jordan Messner, Graduate Research Intern The Kaiser Family Foundation published a report on October 13 examining the uninsured population in the United States and their options for coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The report found that although 32.3 million nonelderly people were uninsured at the beginning of 2015, 49% of these individuals (15.7…

  • More People Have Health Coverage in Every State Thanks to ACA; Yet Some of the Poorest are Being Left Behind

    Guest

    by Suzanne Wikle, Projector Director, Advancing Strategies for Aligning Programs, CLASP When President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA) into law, advocates hailed it as the most important health legislation since the creation of Medicaid and Medicare in 1965 — and one of the most important anti-poverty laws in decades as well. The monumental…

  • Arkansas’s Health Care Reform Forum: Medicaid Expansion and the Private Option

    CCFadmin

    How has the Affordable Care Act and health care reform directly affected consumers and access to health care? How does Medicaid expansion relate to the broader health reform effort? How has Arkansas’s Private Option affected the state’s health care system? What makes a premium assistance model appealing for health care Arkansas and other states? These…

  • A Look at the Latest Controversy Brewing over the ACA: The Annual Limit on Out-of Pocket Costs

    JoAnn Volk

    By JoAnn Volk, Center on Health Insurance Reforms The latest dust up in Washington is a fight between the Obama Administration and employer groups over the Affordable Care Act provision that limits consumers’ annual out-of-pocket costs. Employers are concerned that recent administration guidance “clarifying” the rules to implement this policy will increase their costs, particularly…

  • King v Burwell: An Exercise in Sound and Fury Signifying Nothing

    Guest

    By  Tim Westmoreland, Georgetown University O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Everyone within reach of an electronic device already knows that the Supreme Court has upheld the Affordable Care Act (ACA) again today. Tax subsidies can continue to assist low-income people in States that do not establish their own insurance exchanges. The death spiral…

  • Highest Court in the Land Upholds the Affordable Care Act (Twice)!

    Joan Alker

    Just like most of you, I took a deep breath when I saw the Supreme Court decision in King v Burwell announced today. Here at CCF, we all high-fived but now I’m lamenting the fact that we had to waste all of this time and energy worrying about what would happen if the opponents of…

  • Waiting on King… what’s at stake?

    Elisabeth Wright Burak

    It feels like déjà vu. The health policy world is waiting on pins and needles to see what the Supreme Court has to say about the viability of the Affordable Care Act. On possible decision days, all browsers are pointed to SCOTUSblog.com. But this time we are waiting for a decision in King v. Burwell…

  • Healthcare.gov Fixes System Glitch in Counting Social Security Income for Certain Tax Dependents

    Tricia Brooks

    Earlier this week, Health Affairs ran a lengthy blog I wrote about how Healthcare.gov incorrectly counts Social Security income for tax dependents who are not required to file taxes. Policy experts and enrollment assisters had suspected the system glitch existed for some time before CMS confirmed the error in early March. Thankfully, the problem is…

  • Confused about What Happens at Tax Time? FAQs on Penalties, Exemptions, Reconciliation, and SEPs:

    Tricia Brooks

    By  Tricia Brooks, Sandy Ahn, Sabrina Corlette, and JoAnn Volk As part of our Robert Wood Johnson Foundation funded work in providing technical assistance to consumer assisters in five states, we are getting a lot of questions about issues related to tax time and health coverage. Here are some of the common questions and answers.…

  • Why Should Pregnancy Trigger an SEP? The Risks and Impact of going without Prenatal Care

    CCFadmin

    As OE2 comes to a close, we are thinking more and more about the particulars when it comes to Special Enrollment Periods (SEP) and who may qualify in the upcoming months. SEPs provide an opportunity for individuals to enroll in health insurance after a major life-changing events such as getting married, moving, losing a job,…

  • Getting MAGI Right: Changes to Income Counting Rules in Medicaid and CHIP

    Tricia Brooks

    Last week, we released a primer on the basics of MAGI – how rules for counting household size and income to determine eligibility for Medicaid and CHIP have been aligned with Marketplace subsidies. The move to MAGI has brought about a number of changes in Medicaid and CHIP, but to further complicate things, there are…

  • Getting MAGI Right: When Does Social Security Income Count?

    Tricia Brooks

    Last week, we released a primer on the basics of MAGI – how rules for counting household size and income to determine eligibility for Medicaid and CHIP have been aligned with Marketplace subsidies. The move to MAGI has brought about a number of changes in Medicaid and CHIP, but to further complicate things, there are…

  • Getting MAGI Right: An Assisters Worksheet for Determining Household Size in Medicaid and CHIP

    Tricia Brooks

    Last week, we released a primer on the basics of MAGI – how rules for counting household size and income to determine eligibility for Medicaid and CHIP have been aligned with Marketplace subsidies. The move to MAGI has brought about a number of changes, but to further complicate things, there are some differences that apply…

  • Getting MAGI Right: Exceptions for Who Counts in the Household for Medicaid and CHIP

    Tricia Brooks

    Last week, we released a primer on the basics of MAGI – how rules for counting household size and income to determine eligibility for Medicaid and CHIP have been aligned with Marketplace subsidies. The move to MAGI has brought about a number of changes in Medicaid and CHIP, but to further complicate things, there are…

  • Getting MAGI Right: Differences in Medicaid and CHIP Add Complexity

    Tricia Brooks

    Next to the fact that millions of people are gaining health insurance, one of my favorite aspects of the ACA is its transformation of Medicaid – moving Medicaid into a modern era by harnessing technology and tapping trusted sources of electronic data to determine eligibility in real time. Launching a new high-performing eligibility system is…

  • Getting MAGI Right: A Primer on Differences that Apply to Medicaid and CHIP

    CCFadmin

    Although Medicaid, CHIP, and tax subsidies in the marketplaces share a common method for determining eligibility – known as MAGI – there are several exceptions that apply only to specific circumstances in Medicaid and CHIP. These exceptions, along with significant changes in Medicaid/CHIP eligibility, pre- and post-ACA, add complexity to the implementation of MAGI, both…

  • CCF to MACPAC: CHIP Should Continue While Policymakers Work to Improve Marketplace Coverage for Kids

    CCFadmin

    By Sean Miskell As the expiration of funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) approaches and policy makers consider its role in the new health coverage landscape, it’s a good time to take stock of CHIP coverage and whether or not comparable and affordable coverage is available to families through the new health insurance…

  • How Do Minimum Essential Coverage and Minimum Value Tests Impact Consumers with Employer-Offered Coverage

    Guest

    By JoAnn Volk and Sandy Ahn, Center on Health Insurance Reforms Open enrollment in the Health Insurance Marketplaces overlaps this year with many employer plan open enrollment periods, which has prompted some employees to ask questions about how their offer of employer coverage may affect their eligibility for premium tax credits for a marketplace plan.…

  • A Step Forward For Lawfully Present Immigrants Living in Poverty

    Sonya Schwartz

    It’s no secret that during last year’s open enrollment many applicants for health coverage in immigrant families faced major barriers to enrolling in marketplace coverage. One big problem was that lawfully present immigrants with income under 100 percent FPL—who are ineligible for Medicaid based on their immigration status but are eligible for premium tax credits…