A record 19 million Americans are expected to purchase individual coverage, also known as Obamacare, via the health insurance marketplace under the Affordable Care Act for the 2024 coverage year.
The Biden administration Wednesday said more than 15.3 million Americans have already have signed up for health insurance marketplace plans in states that use HealthCare.gov, which is a 33% increase compared to this time a year ago.
“As of December 15, 2023, for HealthCare.gov states and December 9, 2023, for State-based Marketplaces, preliminary data projects that over 19 million consumers will enroll in 2024 coverage through the ACA Marketplaces — over 7 million more than when President Biden took office,” the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said Wednesday. “This includes 15.3 million individuals who have selected a health plan using the HealthCare.gov platform. On December 15 alone, the deadline for coverage starting January 1, 2024, more than 745,000 people selected a Marketplace plan through HealthCare.gov — the largest single day in history.”
The record enrollment comes with such coverage becoming integral to Americans, having been offered on exchanges now for a decade with most of the enrollment coming from those renewing coverage year after year.
Why are they acting like this is a good thing?
It’s a sign that lots of Americans don’t have a job with benefits.
To really get an idea tho, we need to use percentages not total numbers. Since population keeps increasing, total numbers just go up organically.
We need to actually fix healthcare. We got nowhere close to even what Obama started asking for, but after it got argued down by Republicans and moderates, neither party wants to increase it.
Republicans want to break it just to break it. And dem party leadership barely wants to fight to keep what we have, there just aren’t enough progressives in office yet to overcome moderates so we can actually getting something close to what every other developed nation has.
Its a good thing because it means more people have healthcare coverage. That is a measurably better situation for millions of Americans.
I’d actually prefer if my healthcare wasn’t tied to my job. I’d prefer single payer even. But you’re measuring this as a negative by using the old yardstick as what should exist.
“Perfect is the enemy of good” -Voltaire
I agree we need to do more, but this the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) was the biggest step of progress in decades. This article is pointing out that even more people today are benefiting from it now 13 years after its passage.
That’s like saying it’s a good thing food banks exist…
It is.
But it’s not a good thing they *need to exist.
The issue is a majority of elected officials are fine with the current status quo. Moderates argued Obama down, and ever since they’ve opposed their own party fixing it.
Like, you understand the American healthcare system is still fucked right?
Yeah, this is a little like going “underemployment hit record highs” and treating it like a celebration. It’s great the program exists, but the fact that it needs to exist is utterly fucked. We shouldn’t be treating this as a win. It’s a sign that things are really fucking dire. They’re celebrating the fact that people are being forced to use an ultra expensive safety net, instead of just fixing the system that necessitates the need for the safety net in the first place.
Imagine a headline that said “Food Bank Usage Sets Another Record Even As Trump Threatens The Law Yet Again” instead, because it’s essentially the same thing in a different wrapper. It’s great the program exists as a stopgap, but holy shit this is bad news. This is some straight up Orphan Crushing Machine stuff.