And if the wording we were discussing was “There will be a net reduction of 24 million insured people by 2026 from our previous estimate,” I would agree. You used “net reduction,” in your description.
For some reason I think we may be talking past each other, but let me throw this out there. (I’m not going to open the report again in a new window, so these numbers are from memory but pretty close.)
CBO estimates that under the ACA, barring surprises, roughly 28 million are projected to be uninsured in 2026. Under AHCA, that number is 52 million. Of the higher number, roughly 9 million would be lost from the exchanges (in part due to the end of the individual mandate, in part due to cost increases for some individuals), about 9 million due to cuts to Medicaid, and the rest due to various factors, by far the biggest is that fewer businesses would offer coverage for employees.
Here is a post that discusses the figure:
This goes beyond “losing” and says “throwing 24 million people off.”
Is this an accurate summary on BPC’s part, Ravenman?
I think it inaccurately reflects CBO’s findings. It isn’t clear how many of the 9 million would simply not buy coverage because they’d prefer not to. Let’s just say it is 6 million (for all I know it could be 8 million or 1 million, I’m just picking a number for illustrative purposes). That means 18 million are facing “legitimate” healthcare cuts, as Todd Akin might say, which means your concern about how this policy is described seem like a classic attempt at distraction from the real issue.
since they say “some,” I don’t know how the numbers break out. Does anyone?
I am not concerned; I just stepped to that discussion.
It doesn’t seem like they break it out.
But at least the bar has been moved from “CBO can’t estimate its way out of a wet paper bag” to “I wish they would provide more details!” 
I’m getting this from the .pdf file and the copy/paste is ugly. But 4 million people will lose coverage voluntarily in 2017, due to the end of mandates. In 2018, 14 million more will be uninsured: 6 million in nongroup (exchanges), 5 million in Medicaid, and 2 million in employer group.
If more numbers are needed, I’m sure we can find them.
And yes, I’m looking for the missing million.
That’s the 14 million. What about the 23/24 million that Budget Player Cadet described as being thrown off?
That’s in 2026.
Yes, but of that number, how many are people who voluntarily relinquish due to the absence of a mandate?
You’re saying some are losing coverage on purpose, due to the end of mandates? That would be the 4 million immediately and about 6 million (non-group) next year. Any further out than that, and I’m not seeing what the point is.
I found what I was looking for, it answers some questions I had.
The point is that Budget Player Cadet (among others) characterized the loss of insurance as “being thrown off.” And the number of people he said were being thrown off was 24 million. I was writing in support of the claim that this number was incorrect, since it included people that voluntarily left (or were estimated to leave) when the mandate ended.
Arg, this will teach me about going by memory even after I read the CBO estimate like six times. The 9 million/9 million/few million detail I gave a few posts back was the estimate for 2020, not 2026. I regret the error in describing the right numbers for the wrong year.
For 2026, here is how the 24 million breaks out: 14 million fewer due to Medicaid cuts; 7 million fewer due to fewer businesses offering coverage; 2 million fewer on the exchanges (for any reason, either preference or cost), and 1 million for miscellaneous reasons.
Let’s just give you that all 2 million fewer on the exchanges is due to preference, not price. That’s still 22 million who, in even greater likelihood, could legitimately claim that their health care is literally being taken away by the bill.
I’m starting to revise my opinion on Budget Player Cadet’s statement. Sounds like he was more right than I understood.
Does it really matter to your central objection to the ACA, and the subsequent favoring of the house bill as the source of this thread? If the figure is 22M instead of 24M, does that change the argument in any meaningful way? I can’t see that it does. I think it’s important to get the underlying facts correct, but they don’t change the argument.
I do think “thrown off” for that number is inaccurate, although what he said is mostly true, and I appreciate his outrage on our behalf.
It is still roughly 24 million people uninsured in two years, and the start of what looks like a massive train wreck planned for the future.
Wouldn’t such regional health insurance systems be subject to regulation by the federal government since interstate commerce is the responsibility of the federal government? That would severely limit the types of regional-universal health insurance coverage programs available. For example, I doubt a plan to have a single payer system in the greater Northeast would be allowed, or its existence would be continually under threat by the composition of the federal government. Many states could not afford a single payer system on their own (e.g. Vermont) and individual states’ plans might be limited if the companies they need to tax are not limited to the state developing the plan.
I see no reason to limit our options for obtaining a more equitable society where basic needs are readily met in the name of what is, in the end, really just an interpretation of the responsibilities of state and federal governments.
No, you’re absolutely right; it’s not even tangential to my argument. But there seemed to be a certain confusion with D’Aconia’s point, so I tried to help clarify.
Why?
You’re absolutely right that a multi-state plan would be eligible for federal regulation as interstate commerce. But why so confident that this would be fatal? The wisest path is for the Feds to say they won’t, even though they can.