# How many new people have health insurance due to obamacare now **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 29, 2014, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835 "2014-03-29T16:19:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/21 "2014-11-02T03:30:22Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > So on the whole it was a financial failure. We could have just expanded the role of medicaid and used the existing bureaucracy or made it a major tax deduction for low income people. We saw how well that went over with the GOP. [GOP Governors Reject Obamacare’s Medicaid Expansion, Millions To Stay Uninsured As Result](http://www.bustle.com/articles/6227-gop-governors-reject-obamacares-medicaid-expansion-millions-to-stay-uninsured-as-result) > [@](#): > > In total, 26 states have rejected the expansion, including the state of Mississippi, which has the highest rate of uninsured poor people in the country. Sixty-eight percent of uninsured single mothers live in the states that rejected the expansion, as do 60 percent of the nation’s uninsured working poor. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/22 "2014-11-02T04:37:53Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > Older people who lost their job had a tougher time getting hired because of the increase in health care costs. The jobs available shifted to [temp jobs](http://online.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303910404579485303369082202) and part time jobs. People with college educations ended up displacing those at the bottom of the rung. That was a bad thing. > > the 1.36 trillion dollar price tag would be a bad thing. It was suppose to help 30 million people but only 8 million signed up. So instead of costing a whopping $45,333 per person it cost $170,000. We could have bought each person in need a car filled with money. Oh, and that doesn’t include the extra cost to the consumer and businesses. The linked article is behind their paywall, so I can’t comment on it. However the move to part time and temp jobs long predates ACA, in order to keep from having to give benefits to employees. I’m a bit confused by your math. People signing up on the web sites are different from people now being covered by Medicaid. If the budget was designed to support all the state signing up, and Republican states don’t, cite that the money will be spent anyhow? > [@](#): > > So on the whole it was a financial failure. We could have just expanded the role of medicaid and used the existing bureaucracy or made it a major tax deduction for low income people. Major tax deduction - low income person. Why do these things not go together? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/23 "2014-11-02T05:03:06Z")
Since even the OP seems to want to discuss issues beyond the factual questions he originally asked, let’s move this to Great Debates. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![JesterX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JesterX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JesterX)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/24 "2014-11-02T06:07:06Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Can we have a cite for that? And what if a person didn’t want more coverage, because it cost more than he wanted to pay. How can that be called “better”? > > I’ll give you a hint: There is not a factual answer to that question, and we’d need to debate it in GD. “Better” is subjective. [Cite](http://www.factcheck.org/2014/04/millions-lost-insurance/) > [@](#): > > It’s true that insurance companies discontinued health plans that had covered millions of people who had bought them directly rather than through an employer. **That’s because those plans didn’t meet the coverage standards of the new law.** It’s “better” because most of those that had policies cancelled qualified for subsidies to purchase new plans that offered more coverage. ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/25 "2014-11-02T06:15:21Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > Insurance that was cancelled was cancelled either entirely or largely due to the fact that the insurance did not offer as much coverage as the ACA mandated. This also gets to a point of why simply the reduction in uninsured people doesn’t show the whole story. In my case, the insurance my employer provided was rudimentary to the point of uselessness, but it kept me out of the “uninsured” column. Now they’ve had to switch to an ACA-compliant plan that actually, ya know, pays for stuff. It’s anecdata and all that, but I think quite a lot of previously purported “insured” people have gone from being extremely underinsured to now being meaningfully covered, even if some of them don’t even realize it. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 8:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/26 "2014-11-02T08:18:20Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > We saw how well that went over with the GOP. > > [GOP Governors Reject Obamacare’s Medicaid Expansion, Millions To Stay Uninsured As Result](http://www.bustle.com/articles/6227-gop-governors-reject-obamacares-medicaid-expansion-millions-to-stay-uninsured-as-result) And your point is? ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 10:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/27 "2014-11-02T10:28:41Z")
> [@Flyer](#): > > Because doing this “good thing” tramples all over the Constitution. You know what I love about this statement? You’re not a person in a position to make any sort of definitive statement about this issue. You have no legal authority to interpret the constitution. You know who does? The supreme court. Those guys are very literally the arbiters of right and wrong when it comes to examining the constitution. No exaggeration - it’s literally their role in government to interpret the constitution and determine how it applies to various situations. I wonder what they had to say about Obamacare… ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/28 "2014-11-02T11:42:57Z")
> [@JesterX](#): > > [Cite](http://www.factcheck.org/2014/04/millions-lost-insurance/) > > It’s “better” because most of those that had policies cancelled qualified for subsidies to purchase new plans that offered more coverage. I don’t qualify for a subsidy, so that’s useless to me. Don’t sell me something I can’t use and tell me it’s “better”. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/29 "2014-11-02T11:44:44Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > You know what I love about this statement? You’re not a person in a position to make any sort of definitive statement about this issue. You have no legal authority to interpret the constitution. > > You know who does? > > The supreme court. Those guys are very literally the arbiters of right and wrong when it comes to examining the constitution. No exaggeration - it’s literally their role in government to interpret the constitution and determine how it applies to various situations. > > I wonder what they had to say about Obamacare… They had different things to say about different parts. The entire bill has not be ruled on, yet, so it doesn’t really make sense to ask what the SCOTUS said about it. (Not that I agree with the poster you were responding to, but it’s not quite as simple as you would imply.) ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/30 "2014-11-02T13:48:52Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Since even the OP seems to want to discuss issues beyond the factual questions he originally asked, let’s move this to Great Debates. > > Colibri > General Questions Moderator No I don’t, I was responding to someone throwing the phrase ‘unconstitutional’ around to slander any bill that doesn’t fit into his geopolitical agenda. It is like if I said anyone who didn’t support my agenda was fascist. Its absurd. I revived this thread because I asked a question in March, and back then the info wasn’t out to answer it. Now that info is out, the rate of uninsured people has dropped by about 25%, or 8-11 million. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/31 "2014-11-02T13:52:48Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > the 1.36 trillion dollar price tag would be a bad thing. It was suppose to help 30 million people but only 8 million signed up. So instead of costing a whopping $45,333 per person it cost $170,000. We could have bought each person in need a car filled with money. Do you have a cite that the “1.36 trillion dollar price tag”(\*) is independent of number of sign-ups? If only one person signed up, would the cost be 1.36 trillion dollars per person? Out of curiosity, does the idea that that cost is independent of number seem plausible to you? At the risk of sounding snarky, I find your claim … [checks forum] odd. (\* - Even a cite for your price tag might be interesting. The first Google hit notes that “[despite the scare number, Obamacare] is estimated to result in an overall net decrease of the deficit.” ) ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/32 "2014-11-02T13:53:54Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Can we have a cite for that? And what if a person didn’t want more coverage, because it cost more than he wanted to pay. How can that be called “better”? > > I’ll give you a hint: There is not a factual answer to that question, and we’d need to debate it in GD. “Better” is subjective. The new plans have to cover certain consumer protections like the ten essential health benefits and max out of pocket limitations. So the plans in general are better because if a plan hit all the consumer protections from the ACA it should still be in existence. The people who got hurt are young healthy (usually males) who bought insurance on the individual marketplace. With the ACA now that risk is spread out more their premiums have gone up for the same coverage. They didn’t come out ahead. ---
**Author:** ![GrumpyBunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bc8723/32.png) [@GrumpyBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrumpyBunny)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/33 "2014-11-02T13:55:55Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > We could have just expanded the role of medicaid and used the existing bureaucracy or made it a major tax deduction for low income people. I personally think we should have expanded Medicare for all. Medicaid is state-level and harder to oversee. I don’t think a tax deduction will help a lot of low-income people. I mean, it’ll help, but paying for insurance up-front will be a monetary hardship. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/34 "2014-11-02T14:01:52Z")
> [@Magiver](#): > > Your friend’s insurance is not a bad thing. That’s obvious. The people in his position whose insurance went up was a bad thing. I went 6 years without a decent paying job. This hurt me directly. In a 1 for 1 comparison, it’s still a good thing because your friend got insurance but it made my struggle all the worse. I sold off assets and liquidated retirement funds to get by. > > The people who [can’t get a doctor](http://articles.latimes.com/2014/feb/04/business/la-fi-obamacare-patients-20140205) under Obama care is a bad thing. [Doctors have been dropped](http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/18/politics/obamacare-insurers-dumping-doctors/) by insurance companies and that’s a bad thing. > > Older people who lost their job had a tougher time getting hired because of the increase in health care costs. The jobs available shifted to [temp jobs](http://online.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303910404579485303369082202) and part time jobs. People with college educations ended up displacing those at the bottom of the rung. That was a bad thing. > > the 1.36 trillion dollar price tag would be a bad thing. It was suppose to help 30 million people but only 8 million signed up. So instead of costing a whopping $45,333 per person it cost $170,000. We could have bought each person in need a car filled with money. Oh, and that doesn’t include the extra cost to the consumer and businesses. > > So on the whole it was a financial failure. We could have just expanded the role of medicaid and used the existing bureaucracy or made it a major tax deduction for low income people. That 1.36 trillion dollar figure is over 10 years, so $136 billion a year. Plus how much of that is savings because now people who were uninsured are no longer passing their costs onto other consumers? The uninsured don’t live in a vacuum. They still need health care, the costs are just passed onto other people in the form of higher medical costs and taxes. So the total net cost is likely less than $136 billion a year because state costs or private costs should go down a bit, but I don’t know by how much. Also keep in mind medicaid has lower reimbursement rates than private insurance, so millions covered by medicaid will cost less than millions covered by private insurance. That 1.36 trillion figure is highly misleading. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/35 "2014-11-02T14:12:55Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > The new plans have to cover certain consumer protections like the ten essential health benefits and max out of pocket limitations. So the plans in general are better because if a plan hit all the consumer protections from the ACA it should still be in existence. Except when it’s not. As a male, I didn’t need contraception and maternity coverage, but now I am paying for it. It doesn’t make my plan better. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/36 "2014-11-02T14:17:12Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > Except when it’s not. As a male, I didn’t need contraception and maternity coverage, but now I am paying for it. It doesn’t make my plan better. And there are unfortunate women who have to pay for your vasectomy or prostate care. It all evens out. ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/37 "2014-11-02T14:20:36Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > I can’t help thinking about this. Ten million people, going online and setting up their ACA, and somehow this was a daunting problem that it took months to enable in terms of software. > > By contrast, I entered ESPN’s March Madness basketball tournament contest. I got an on=screen matrix of the 63 games, checked a predicted winner of each gane, and hit enter. Apparently, so did about ten million other people, about the same as the number signing up for ACA. > > At any time, I can go on line, and with one click, see my bracket choices, how many I got right, which games I got right, where I stand on the leader board (currently 5,249,858th – Barack Obama is ahead of me, 2,401,346th), and all ten-million participant brackets are updated within seconds of the buzzer at the end of each game, at which time I can view the results of any of the ten million entries. > > Maybe the ACA should have asked ESPN to set up the registration site for them. Handling ten million complicated submissions and keeping them up to date within seconds of changes and instantly accessible in full detail to everyone doesn’t seem to fluster ESPN at all. And what privacy are the privacy requirements ESPN is covered by? What foreign governments launch regular sophisticated attacks on ESPN? What is the worst case scenario if your bracket choices are made public? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/38 "2014-11-02T14:42:37Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > And there are unfortunate women who have to pay for your vasectomy or prostate care. > > It all evens out. Really? It all evens out exactly? That’ astonishing!! It’s… unbelievable. Look, if you want to make the case that more people are better off with Obamacare, that is one thing. But to claim that every single person is better off… well, you’re going to have to prove that, and I think it’s an impossible thing to do. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/39 "2014-11-02T14:49:57Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Do you have a cite that the “1.36 trillion dollar price tag”(\*) is independent of number of sign-ups? If only one person signed up, would the cost be 1.36 trillion dollars per person? Out of curiosity, does the idea that that cost is independent of number seem plausible to you? > > At the risk of sounding snarky, I find your claim … [checks forum] odd. > > (\* - Even a cite for your price tag might be interesting. The first Google hit notes that “[despite the scare number, Obamacare] is estimated to result in an overall net decrease of the deficit.” ) There was a range of estimates so I posted the [lower one.](http://obamacarefacts.com/costof-obamacare/)[This cite](http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/cbo-obamacare-s-10-year-costs-will-now-eclipse-2-trillion_778723.html) links the CBO revised estimate. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2014, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835/40 "2014-11-02T14:54:35Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > And there are unfortunate women who have to pay for your vasectomy or prostate care. > > It all evens out. I’m not talking about what is fair, right, or good (although I would dispute that paying for maternity care is somehow equal to a one time vasectomy or prostate issues) I am taking issue with the repeated assertion that these ten mandatory items are simply consumer protection and therefore make each and every individual’s policy “better.” It’s really indisputable that many of those ten items are things that people don’t want or need, and therefore a forced inclusion of them don’t make the policies better. For example, if a new law made it mandatory for home owners insurance policies to cover flood damage, and forced each policy holder to pay a pro rata share of the increased costs, nobody that lives in the Nevada desert would think that their policies are now “better.” Of course those that live in flood plains along the Mississippi river are happy, but that’s only because the next guy is shouldering part of what they rightfully should be paying for on their own. As a male, I am not going to be giving birth. It is absurd to price an insurance policy against my health as having a possibility that I could give birth. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-new-people-have-health-insurance-due-to-obamacare-now/684835.md?page=3)