Obamacare Enrollment Edges Lower to 11.4 Million
Health Care

Obamacare Enrollment Edges Lower to 11.4 Million

Jonathan Bachman

About 11.4 million people signed up for Affordable Care Act plans in 2019, down from 11.8 million in 2018 and a high of 12.7 million in 2016, according to data released Monday by the Trump administration. The average premium also fell for the first time.

Larry Levitt of the Kaiser Family Foundation notes that signups in states using the federal exchange have declined since 2016 while those in states running their own marketplaces have held steady, with one possible explanation for the difference being a reduction in federal outreach under the Trump administration.

“The ACA insurance marketplace is stable,” Levitt writes. “But, reversing enrollment declines would likely require undoing outreach reductions and increasing subsidies, and that would cost money.”

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