From my blog, see link for full analysis: https://polimetrics.substack.com/p/enhanced-obamacare-subsidies-expire
Data from KFF.org. Graphic made with Datawrapper.
Enhanced Obamacare subsidies expire December 31st. I mapped the premium increases by congressional district, and the political geography is really interesting.
Many ACA Marketplace enrollees live in Republican congressional districts, and most are in states Trump won in 2024. These are also the districts facing the steepest premium increases if Congress doesn’t act.
Why? Red states that refused Medicaid expansion pushed millions into the ACA Marketplace. Enrollment in non-expansion states has grown 188% since 2020 compared to 65% in expansion states.
The map shows what happens to a 60-year-old couple earning $82,000 (just above the subsidy eligibility cutoff). Wyoming districts see premium increases of 400-597%. Southern states see 200-400% increases. That couple goes from paying around $580/month to $3,400/month in some areas.
If subsidies expire, the CBO estimates 3.8 million more Americans become uninsured. Premiums will rise further as healthy people drop coverage. 24 million Americans are currently enrolled in Marketplace plans, and 22 million receive enhanced subsidies.
by Public_Finance_Guy
23 Comments
I don’t know anyone enrolled in “Obamacare”. I know people enrolled under the ACA though.
Whelp, as sad as it is, maybe they’ll learn something.
Check out the third picture, then realize that 72% of Wyoming voted for Trump.
Ah yes, the orange color that means a number somewhere between 20 and 597. So useful.
I have no idea how I would have survived the past decade without the ACA. I’d put it up there with the interstate highway system and the moon landing.
In the 3rd slide, including Alaska and Hawaii at such low percentages makes the rest of the color scale hard to understand. I would have liked to have seen the map with those excluded.
[That last map 💀](https://youtu.be/1vrEljMfXYo?si=_GovG28MAxE3RQxJ)
I use it. Next year my wife and I are throwing the idea of just not having health insurance for the time being.
I’m using this calculator (looks like the same source):
[https://www.kff.org/interactive/calculator-aca-enhanced-premium-tax-credit/](https://www.kff.org/interactive/calculator-aca-enhanced-premium-tax-credit/)
And getting nothing like your info.
I did a 60-year old couple in Wyoming making $82,000 and got in increase on a silver plan from $560/mo to $681/mo. Bronze plans are still free whether or not the subsidies come back or not.
Is this calculator just way off?
God bless living in Southern California.
Your color gradient is bad and you should feel bad
Curious why Utah is so high? Wonder if it has anything to do with Romney as ACA was born from Romneycare in MA
This chart is posted hourly so the bots can proclaim “Republicans voting against their own interests.” Everyone knows the southern tip of Florida and Texas is the Republican mecca.
Lol that gradient scale on the last map. 20 to 597 is wild.
Crazy too look at the first graph and see our 2 southern points so dependent. You’d think millionaire/billionaire class but South Florida is retirees and South Texas/ corpus christi is just depression
It’s what they voted for. Good for them
“It hurt itself in its confusion.”
The piece people are missing here is how much premiums are going up in 2026 across all of healthcare. 18% increases in one year is insane. That is 18% increase before millions of healthy young people drop off next year. With or without those enhanced subsidies, a plan for a couple shouldn’t cost $30k/year under any scenario. ACA needs a rehaul.
It’s even more stunning that insurance companies are pulling out of ACA because they are either losing money or seeing very slim margins.
missouri adopted the expansion by refereundum but the legislators gave it a budget of $0.
Republicans love to hurt themselves and blame the Democrats. It’s a disease
See those random yellow states that generally vote conservative? Those are medicaid expansion states lmao. I was confused because KY has a very good marketplace platform called Kynect so I expected more people to be on it, but then remembered we are an expansion state.
I worked at a KY medicaid and SNAP office for a long time, a shitload of white conservative rednecks are on medicaid and simultaneously hate “obamacare” lmfao.
edit: damn I wrote this whole ass comment before reading OP’s description that basically says the same thing but better.
I’m not looking to turn this into a political argument.
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but my rudimentary understanding of the subsidies, using your example, is that the plan costs $3400/month and this couple pays $580 while the Gov pays the remaining $2820.
So if the insurance companies lose a combined 22M+ subsidies at $2500 a piece (not real numbers), wouldn’t that a loss of $55B to their collective bottom lines? With that much loss, it seems like that would have to lower their premiums to get more folks to sign up.
Again, not looking for a political argument/fight, just holes in my thinking.
Sure sounds like it wasn’t too much an affordable care act as passed back in the day. Boy I remember how great my insurance coverage was before then and how little I paid for much more. Have a preexisting condition too.