Health Policy and Politics: The Affordable Care Act • BestNursingWriters

Health Policy and Politics: The Affordable Care Act Essay Assignment Paper

Discussion: Politics and the Patient Protection

Health Policy and Politics: The Affordable Care Act

The Affordable Care Act (ACA), famously known as Obamacare, sought to enhance universal healthcare access by making health insurance to be inexpensive for all Americans. ACA targeted individual market, employer-provided benefits, and non-Medicare-eligible population to ensure they accessed affordable and comprehensive insurance coverage without any discrimination on the basis of their health status (Nadash, Miller, Jones, Gusmano, & Rosenbaum, 2018). The Republican Party seeks to stop government interference in the insurance market. It has spearheaded efforts to repeal and replace the ACA through the courts terming it as unconstitutional. Additionally, several states have shown open hostility to the law since it expanded the Medicaid coverage. Besides, House and Senate Republicans have sponsored several repeal initiatives such as Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA) and Graham-Cassidy bills (Nadash et al., 2018). The constant onslaught of the ACA from President Trump and Republicans has led to an increase in premiums and several insurers withdrawing from selling the insurance plans in the recent past. The early success of the ACA, whereby millions of Americans secured insurance coverage through the individual markets, subsidies for low-income individuals, and Medicaid, have been eroded.Discussion: Politics and the Patient Protection

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The Impact of Cost-Benefit Analysis

Milstead and Short (2019) argue that the supporters and critics of ACA include the members of Congress whose main objective is to be re-elected during the election cycles. The opponent’s debates and efforts to repeal and replacement of ACA in both President Obama and Trump’s administrations are deliberate for political expediency as opposed to promoting public health and well-being. Furthermore, the political elites do not perform a cost-benefit analysis of the effectiveness of the ACA to enable them to compromise on a bipartisan basis about the contentious issues contained in the law, such as the insurance mandates, Medicaid, insurance plans, and tax credits.

Analysis of Votes

Notably, the ACA resulted in a progressive American tax system whereby the wealthy individuals were obligated to pay higher federal taxes, 3.8% more on taxes on unearned income and a 0.9% increase in Medicare payroll taxes. The new tax revenue was earmarked to fund the expansions proposed by the ACA (Grogan, 2017). Additionally, the law delimited the out-of-pocket costs for marketplace insurance coverage, specifically $13,200 and $6,600 for family and individual plans (Grogan, 2017). The subsidies and financing options of ACA ensured equitable access to healthcare and lowered the financial burden of healthcare costs for the majority of low-income Americans. According to Congressional Budget Office, The Joint Committee on Taxation, and The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, repealing and replacing the ACA will increase Medicaid costs by over $370 billion over the next decade, which would be covered by the states (Grogan, 2017). Besides, eliminating tax directives will benefit the wealthiest people since they will be able to save almost $600 billion through 2026 (Grogan, 2017). Despite such cost-benefit analysis being conducted to determine the effect of repealing and replacing ACA, the legislators focus on their re-election prospects while discussing the merits and demerits of Obamacare. The lawmakers’ support for ACA must be consistent with the views of their electorates and donors. For instance, voting against the Act would have been contrary to the desires of most Republicans, and they risked losing their elective seats in the House or Senate.Discussion: Politics and the Patient Protection

Conclusion. It is evident that ACA not only resulted in national Medicaid expansions and subsidized Marketplace coverage, but it also reduced the cost of medical care and improved access to health services for patients in various age groups. These results would be what any leader would like to experience in their country, that is easy access to affordable and quality care for all people. Nevertheless, legislators would be willing to disregard these benefits to the society if all their chances of re-election would not be increased by them supporting the ACA. It is on the same basis that members of Congress will make decisions on whether to reject or recommend national policies concerning Medicaid/Medicare. Politicians rely on donors and lobbyists for financial support to win their elections. In healthcare, these funders could be medical organizations that are negatively affected by the particular policy under deliberation. As such, to ensure that they continue to receive support from these agencies, legislators have to cater to the interest of their donor and vote to reject a policy that could otherwise, benefit the society. However, this does not mean that they do not believe passing such a proposal into law would be in the best interest of the public. The members of the U.S. Congress usually align with their left- or right-wing political affiliation and support legislations to appease their electorates, lobbyists, and sponsors purposely to ensure they retain their Senate or House seats as opposed to promoting public good in a bipartisan manner.