Obamacare | Whats ObamaCare | Obama Affordable Care Act | What Is Obamacare Simplified | Why Was Obamacare Created | What Is Obama Health Care
Obamacare also known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) or the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a law enacted to ensure that all Americans have access to affordable health insurance. It offers consumers discounts (known as tax credits) on government-sponsored health insurance plans.
It also expands the Medicaid assistance program to include more people. These are mainly the people who don’t have it in their budgets to pay for health care. People only receive discounts to help offset health insurance costs if your household income is between one and four times the Federal Poverty Level.
You can select to apply these credits to your premiums to lower your monthly insurance bill or wait until the end of the year and declare them on your tax return. If you make too much money to qualify for credits, you can still buy a plan on the federal insurance marketplace or your state’s exchange but you won’t get any discounts.
ObamaCare Act
- Annual and lifetime coverage caps on essential benefits were banned.
- Prohibits insurers from dropping policyholders when they get sick.
- All health policies sold in the United States must provide an annual maximum out of pocket (MOOP) payment cap for an individual’s or family’s medical expenses (excluding premiums). After the MOOP payment cap is reached, all remaining costs must be paid by the insurer.
- A partial community rating requires insurers to offer the same premium to all applicants of the same age and location without regard to gender or most pre-existing conditions (excluding tobacco use). Premiums for older applicants can be no more than three times those for the youngest.
- Preventive care, vaccinations and medical screenings cannot be subject to co-payments, co-insurance or deductibles. Specific examples of covered services include: mammograms and colonoscopies, wellness visits, gestational diabetes screening, HPV testing, STI counseling, HIV screening and counseling, contraceptive methods, breastfeeding support/supplies and domestic violence screening and counseling.
- The law established four tiers of coverage: bronze, silver, gold and platinum. All categories offer the essential health benefits. The categories vary in their division of premiums and out-of-pocket costs: bronze plans have the lowest monthly premiums and highest out-of-pocket costs, while platinum plans are the reverse. The percentages of health care costs that plans are expected to cover through premiums (as opposed to out-of-pocket costs) are, on average: 60% (bronze), 70% (silver), 80% (gold), and 90% (platinum).
- Insurers are required to implement an appeals process for coverage determination and claims on all new plans.
- Insurers must spend at least 80–85% of premium dollars on health costs; rebates must be issued to policyholders if this is violated.
Obamacare Facts
1. ACA is main aim is to lower the Cost of Medicare and Medicaid
Medicare and Medicaid takes a very huge chunk of U.S budget. It consumes more than the military and the social security. It consumes a huge budget of $1.05 trillion against $1.005 trillion and $824 billion of social security and military respectrively. It will go a long way in saving the funds. If there’s one thing politicians don’t like, it’s having their hands tied when it comes to spending. It’s the real reason they agreed to reform health care.
2. Majority (60%) of Those Who Are Eligible for Obamacare Subsidies Don’t Even Know It
Seventeen million people qualified for subsidies because they did not have insurance from their employer. Although they made too much money for Medicaid, they are legal residents of the United States. But only 6.6 million did sign up. Don’t be one of the 10.4 million people who didn’t. Make sure you know how to get Obamacare.
3. It Adds Benefits to Those on Medicare
If you have Medicare, then the better for you. There are many other ways that Obamacare affects people differently depending on their situation.
4. It Doesn’t Provide Health Insurance to Illegal Immigrants
5. It has changed How Health Care Is Delivered
The ACA mandated that hospitals, doctors, and pharmacists must work together in ways they never did before. First, all medical records must be recorded electronically instead of on paper. Computerized records allow doctors to easily share their diagnoses and treatments among other measures
Obamacare Pros And Cons | What Is Obamacare And Why Is It Bad
Advantages
- Many Americans Now Have Insurance Coverage.
- Obamacare made Health Care More Affordable.
- Americans can now access Limitless Care Time.
- More Screenings Are Done and this helps in preventing illnesses
- Lower Drug Costs.
Disadvantages
- It has high premium cost for the poor.
- There are penalties for those who fail to get the insurance
- It is a complicated system for the illeterates