Health Insurance Markets

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RAND's New President, the U.S. Foreign Service, Transportation Equity: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on RAND's next president and CEO, Jason Matheny, insights into Americans' views on diplomacy and diplomats, solutions for transportation equity, and more.

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News Manipulation, the Risk of Civil War, Russia and Ukraine: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on tracking news manipulation during the pandemic, the threat of another civil war, preventing health insurance loss, and more.

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How Insurance Marketplace Regulators Can Help Consumers Enroll in Better Coverage

The Affordable Care Act simplified shopping for health care by creating the individual health insurance marketplaces where plans are categorized into labeled tiers. Consumers rely on these labels when comparing plans. But the labels don't tell consumers everything they need to know.

Petra Rasmussen, David M. Anderson

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Options for Designing a Public Option

State and federal policymakers are considering adding state-backed public options to the individual market in an effort to expand health coverage and improve affordability. We analyzed what would happen if public options became available in U.S. health insurance exchanges.

Michael Cohen, Al Bingham, et al.

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RAND's Summer Reading List for Congress

For busy staff, August's respite from back-to-back meetings, hearing preparation, and late votes is hard-earned. The summer recess also provides an opportunity to get ahead of issues that will resurface in the fall. To that end, we have compiled recent RAND research on topics likely to top the congressional agenda come September.

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Addressing Surprise Medical Bills Without Raising the Cost of Health Care

Patients who try to stay within their insurers' networks can be hit with surprise bills when they unknowingly receive care from out-of-network physicians. How much should a physician be paid for providing a service that is critical but rendered without the patient's ready ability to choose an in-network provider?

Erin Lindsey Duffy, Mark W. Friedberg, et al.

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Four Steps That Could Stabilize the Health Insurance Market

Congress will soon discuss options to stabilize the individual market and ensure that all Americans have access to affordable coverage. Policymakers could encourage enrollment, make targeted investments to lower premiums, fund cost-sharing reductions, and enforce the individual mandate.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Repeal-and-Delay Would Make Budget Neutrality for ACA Replacement Difficult

As Congress considers repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, it will need to consider how federal budget scoring can affect the fate of legislation. Depending on the ultimate cost of a replacement, finding enough savings to offset costs while maintaining budget neutrality could make it hard to pass a replacement.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Insuring Younger Adults Through the ACA's Marketplaces: Options to Expand Enrollment

Whether or not the Affordable Care Act is repealed, having young adults participate in the individual health insurance market remains critical to achieving affordable premiums for everyone.

Evan Saltzman, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Estimating the Impacts of the Trump and Clinton Health Plans

Donald Trump wants to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Hillary Clinton wants to maintain and modify it. How could each proposal impact coverage, out-of-pocket costs, and the deficit?

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Modifying the ACA's Family Subsidy Rules to Help Ensure Affordability

The ACA encourages workers to retain employer coverage by restricting their eligibility for marketplace subsidies. Modifying the policy could help 700,000 people gain coverage and lower spending for 1.6 million who are insured but face high health care costs under current ACA policy.

Amado Cordova, Sarah A. Nowak, et al.

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What Happens If the ACA's Tax Credits Are Replaced with Premium Support?

As policymakers consider alternatives to reduce the federal government's financial burden from providing subsidies under the ACA, they should consider the consequences for enrollees. Existing premium-support models yield considerable savings for the federal government but could create age and income disparities in coverage.

Evan Saltzman, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Insurance Enrollment Holds Steady in Advance of the 2016 Open Enrollment Period

Since September 2013, the number of people with health insurance coverage has increased by 16.6 million. But since the second ACA open enrollment period in February 2015, the number of people with coverage has remained relatively flat. The third open enrollment period began on November 1. Whether the number of uninsured will continue to decline remains an open question.

Katherine Grace Carman @KGCarman, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Charging Older Adults Higher Premiums Could Cost Taxpayers

Under the Affordable Care Act, older adults cannot be charged more than three times as much as 21- to 24-year-olds for the same plan. Changing this rule to 5-to-1 may not be a cost-effective way to encourage enrollment among the young and healthy.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner, Evan Saltzman

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The Ramifications of Repealing the Individual Mandate

As part of its goal of near-universal coverage, the Affordable Care Act requires most Americans to obtain insurance or pay a penalty. Repealing that requirement would significantly reduce health insurance enrollment and cause individual market premiums to rise.

Evan Saltzman, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Why Obamacare Lives

Economic reasoning took center stage in the Supreme Court's decision on Thursday to uphold the legality of the Affordable Care Act's subsidies in all states.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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What Americans Know About King v. Burwell

An upcoming Supreme Court ruling regarding the Affordable Care Act could impact millions of Americans. Are Americans aware of the court case? And if so, what do they know about it?

Katherine Grace Carman @KGCarman, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Happy Birthday Healthcare.Gov

This month marks the one-year anniversary of the health insurance Marketplaces -- the online exchanges for buying and selling insurance created by the Affordable Care Act. Last year, after a near-disastrous start that included massive website failures, the Marketplaces rebounded to a surprising success.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Checking the ACA's Vital Signs

Despite pervasive challenges associated with the rollout of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the administration remains optimistic about its fate. Critics, however, have seized upon the recent mishaps as evidence of the ACA's inevitable demise.

Evan Saltzman

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Who Does the Affordable Care Act Leave Behind?

Although one of the primary objectives of the Affordable Care Act is to achieve near-universal health insurance coverage, the Congressional Budget Office projects that 30 million residents, more than 10 percent of the nonelderly population, will remain uninsured after the major provisions of the ACA take full effect.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner, Evan Saltzman

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First Steps on a Long Road: Three Key Findings from ACA's Early Enrollment Numbers

The vision of the ACA was “no wrong door” and an affordable option for everyone, but it appears based on the data available so far that, in the non-Medicaid expansion states, there is a closed door.

Chapin White, Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Four Questions on Canceled Insurance Policy Fix

David Mastio, Forum editor at USA TODAY, asked RAND's Christine Eibner four questions about President Obama's plan to fix the problem with people getting their insurance canceled.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Understanding the Affordable Care Act

One of the chief aims of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is the expansion of insurance coverage to individuals who at present either cannot afford it or choose not to purchase it. Unfortunately, many Americans lack the financial literacy needed to navigate the numerous and complex options thrust upon them by the ACA.

Sebastian Bauhoff, Katherine Grace Carman @KGCarman, et al.

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Will the Affordable Care Act Make Health Care More Affordable?

Out-of-pocket spending on health care will decrease for both the newly insured as well as for those changing their source of insurance. These decreases will be largest for those who would otherwise be uninsured.

Christine Eibner @Chrissyeibner

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Ask Me Anything: Carter Price on the Affordable Care Act

As of October 1, many Americans can now shop for health insurance through state exchanges created as part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the sweeping health care reform often referred to as 'Obamacare.' To provide some insight into the ACA, RAND's Carter Price hosted an 'Ask Me Anything' session on Reddit today.

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Will ACA Implementation Lead to a Spike in Demand for Care?

The growing number of Americans newly-insured under the ACA will undoubtedly lead to a surge in demand for care, whether through Medicaid or insurance exchanges. But, if predictions hold, the increase won't be as dramatic as some may fear, writes David I. Auerbach.

David I. Auerbach

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Helping Obama—and Other Americans—Weigh Which Health Insurance Exchange to Pick

Multistate plans are most likely to appeal to out-of-state students, interstate migrants, out-of-state workers, seasonal movers (e.g., “snowbirds”), and similar groups that require improved access to health care across state lines.

Carter C. Price @CarterCPrice, Amado Cordova, et al.

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Creating More Savvy Consumers Through Public Reporting

Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) surveys are designed to capture patients' experiences in a systematic way that facilitates reporting the results publicly to help other consumers make more savvy care decisions. Consumer choices may influence providers to improve the care they offer so that they can effectively compete in the market.

Mary E. Vaiana

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Would the Affordable Care Act Lead to Reductions in Employer-Sponsored Coverage?

As the U.S. Supreme Court considers the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) individual mandate, one of the questions being debated is what effect the mandate would have on employer-sponsored health insurance coverage. A factor to consider in this is the effect the ACA would have on small businesses, which employ the majority of America's private-sector workforce.