Republican leaders have cited the high cost of the subsidies, (for ACA health insurance) estimated at about $350 billion over 10 years, and potential fraud in enrollments for the program. And they have balked at attaching an extension onto this month’s short-term spending bill.
Not extending these (extra) subsidies means millions of Americans will not be able to afford health insurance and millions more will face financial hardship. That’s just a fact.
You can argue over how we approach healthcare, why these subsidies were political motivated, why they should stop, why some people don’t need them, but the reality is people need insurance and for nearly everyone going it alone is not feasible.
Obamacare never was going to fulfill all the promises made about it, that was obvious from day one, but it did extent coverage to millions and right now that is the best we have.
This is not the time to undermine Americans counting on it.
What happened to the promises for something better?
Trump has used language promising a “great,” “terrific,” or “really great” health plan on multiple occasions, though the exact wording and timing vary. Some examples:
- During his 2016 presidential campaign, he promised to “repeal Obamacare and replace it with something terrific” or “something great.” KFF Health News
- In April 2019, he tweeted:“The Republicans are developing a really great HealthCare Plan with far lower premiums (cost) & deductibles than Obamacare … Vote on the plan will be taken right after the Election.” Vanity Fair
- On September 24, 2020, he unveiled what he called the America First Healthcare Plan, describing it as “delivering better care with more choice, at much lower cost.” It was a rehash of ideas tried and tried and based on the false narrative of competition with nothing to assure coverage.
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
Once more, with feeling – here is the real story about the non-ACA subsidies, the temporary dollop of additional vote buying subsidies designed to reduce costs during the COVID pandemic, which didn’t take effect until 2022, after the pandemic ended and were intentionally, deliberately scheduled to be temporary and end 12/31/25.
From the WSJ: ObamaCare Premiums Are Doubling? Don’t Believe It
The Democrats’ latest scare is based on a misleading study.
Chris Jacobs
As the government shutdown drags on, Democrats claim that “premiums will double” if enhanced ObamaCare subsidies expire as scheduled on Dec. 31. That would be shocking if it were true, but it isn’t. … On Aug. 6, KFF published an analysis showing “a median proposed premium increase of 18%” for insurers’ exchange plans. But on Sept. 30, several of the same researchers issued a second report with a headline asserting that “premium payments would more than double” if enhanced subsidies expire. What happened? Did premium estimates for 2026 rise sixfold in one month?
No. KFF’s second study was misleading. … And the researchers know it. I asked Cynthia Cox, a KFF vice president, about a graphic on the foundation’s home page warning “premiums will more than double.” Ms. Cox acknowledged the claim was inaccurate … KFF didn’t advertise the correction and edited the graphic without publicly disclosing its error. … KFF’s own work demonstrates that the federal government will still pay the vast majority of most enrollees’ premiums … (today, taxpayers) paid an average of 88% of enrollees’ overall premiums. Without them, the federal government would have paid an average of 78% of enrollees’ premiums last year.
…
Most exchange enrollees will face moderate increases in out-of-pocket costs in dollar terms. KFF estimated that the average enrollee will pay $1,016 more per year, or $84.67 more per month. …
most households will likely face increases of $50 to $100 a month…. Reasonable people can disagree about the wisdom of a $50 to $100 monthly cost increase for households of modest means. … The left’s apocalyptic rhetoric about the expiration of the enhanced subsidies belies that federal taxpayers will still subsidize three-quarters of enrollees’ premium costs. …
BenefitJack note: And, for the lowest income Americans, as intended and designed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (Health Reform, the ACA, Obamacare), once the non-ACA added dollop of taxpayer subsidies ends, your taxes (and our annual deficits) will continue to fund coverage so that many Americans will continue to pay nothing for their coverage (Medicaid), or will continue to pay monthly premiums of less than $25 per person for exchange coverage.
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Let OBBB make the changes and see what happens. It’s not just the subsidies changing, plans are still raising premiums and not just ACA.
Our Part D coverage is going from $17.80 to $78.00 per month in part because of changing subsidies of another kind. Since the basic premium is not income related, such an increase is a big deal for many people possibly wiping out any COLA. Then of course the increases in Part B and Medigap.
The day before I retired our monthly premium for health benefits was $197, now for everything including Medigap, for two it is over $2,000.
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From today’s WSJ – the Democrats continue to lie about the impact from the lapse of the Biden super subsidies for health coverage, subsidies that were supposedly put in place in 2022 to combat COVID, and that were to expire at year-dne 2025 – as they are now scheduled, as intended.
“The ObamaCare Subsidy ScareMore workers who could get employer coverage aren’t taking it. Why? …”
Sept. 29, 2025 5:44 pm ET
If you haven’t heard, cancer patients and children will die if Republicans don’t agree to extend pandemic-era sweetened ObamaCare subsidies in return for keeping the government open. Or so Democrats claim. But a report Thursday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests many Americans receiving the subsidies could get employer coverage.
The annual BLS survey of employer-sponsored benefits shows that the share of workers with access to medical benefits increased to 74% this year from 71% in 2019. That’s good news. Yet curiously, the share of workers who participate in employer medical plans among those with access to them—i.e., the take-up rate—has fallen to 65% from 73%.
…Why would increasing numbers of lower-income workers reject employer-sponsored coverage? Perhaps because they can now get ObamaCare plans at no cost. …
Workers aren’t supposed to receive ObamaCare subsidies if they have access to “affordable” coverage through their employers, but this rule is barely enforced. …
But the BLS report shows that many workers could get employer coverage if the enhanced subsidies lapse at the end of the year, which would save taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars. “
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And your point? I get subsidized health care, it’s called Medicare.
There are other organizations who have done their own analysis showing the potential loses in coverage including Kaiser.
As you well know, regardless of intended expirations government routinely extends and human nature what it is, people have come to rely on the subsidies as they are, probably not even knowing they were intended to expire.
Regardless, if people see a whopping increase in premiums some are going to drop coverage.
My Part D premium just increased four fold for next year. Since that is not income based, some people will be hurting. The reason, CMS took away some subsidies.
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No, Dick, you do not get subsidized health care from Medicare. If you are like me, you should be confident in knowing that you probably caused to be paid more in FICA-Med to fund Part A, as well as income taxes to fund Medicare Part B and Part D, especially once you include the employer paid FICA-Med taxes and once you adjust for the time value of money, compared to the premium cost for that same coverage.
The problem is that Americans look at the extra Biden dollop of subsidy for calendar years 2022 – 2025 all wrong. They see the expiration of the subsidy as a loss, instead of looking at the last four years of subsidy as an unwarranted, and unnecessary expenditure.
Kaiser estimates that ACA premium payments will more than double on average once enhanced premium tax credits expire – out-of-pocket premium payments will rise by 114%, from an average of $888 in 2025 to $1,904 in 2026. That’s $1,904 per year, on average.
But the reality is that, the premiums should have been perhaps $1,800 a year in 2025, or $150 a month!
So, it isn’t an increase in premiums, it is the known expiration of an unnecessary subsidy – something that was never part of Health Reform.
$150 a month, for a full time worker earning the median wage in America is < 3% of wages, at the 25th percentile, it is about 5.7% of wages.
There is NO GOOD REASON for full time workers earning the median wage of ~$62,000 a year, or full time workers earning the 25th percentile of $31,200 (who are likely paying between $100 and $200 a month for their own household’s coverage) to be paying income taxes in order to fund a taxpayer subsidy for someone whose income exceeds $100,000 to receive a subsidy.
And, it is downright STUPID to increase subsidies and run deficits of $1 – $2 Trillion a year!
Cutting back the Biden extra dollop of COVID subsidies, which were never necessary to begin with, so subsidy levels return tho the levels approved as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 will lower the annual budget deficit – it is long past time!
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To add to my prior comment (below) about OBBB changes that will reduce the deficit (largely offset by stupid spending by the Trump Administration in the same bill) …
The largest OBBBA welfare reforms apply to Medicaid. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that OBBBA’s reforms will reduce Medicaid spending by over $900 billion, including $325 billion from the work requirements alone, by 2034. Medicaid has grown into the single largest means-tested welfare program, with federal outlays increasing by 65 percent from 2016 to 2025 and costing over $909 billion in FY 2024.
In response to record-high caseloads fueled by able-bodied adults without dependents enrolling in the program, OBBBA introduced the first-ever federal work requirements for Medicaid.
The reforms require able-bodied adults without dependents aged 19-64 to work or participate in other qualifying activities (e.g., educational programs, community service, or job training) for at least 80 hours per month. These reforms aim to promote work and personal responsibility while refocusing taxpayer dollars toward low-income children, pregnant women, the elderly, and individuals with disabilities.
To enhance state accountability for waste, fraud, and abuse for Medicaid—which made upwards of $1 trillion in improper payments between 2015 and 2024, OBBBA authorizes the federal government to withhold funds from states with high payment errors. The point of this penalty is to institute accountability for states that otherwise lack strong incentives to conduct proper eligibility and payment verifications – including enrolling individuals who are not “lawfully present” in America (that is the standard from Health Reform/ACA/Obamacare). .
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Once more, with feeling. The COVID credits subsidize high-income earners. Ge Bai writes in the WSJ: “A family of four in AZ making $600K, a married couple in WV making $580K, and a single individual in VT making $180K all qualify for (COVID) subsidies. Simply put, since 2021, Congress has been bribing higher-income Americans to purchase expensive Obamacare plans by hiding the plans’ true price tags using taxpayer dollars.”
Other authors confirm that one-third of this pandemic excess spending goes to individuals with incomes 400 percent above the federal poverty level. … resulting in rampant fraud, estimated at $20 billion per year. … Should the four year, temporary boost be made indefinite (no tax provision is truly permanent), that would add another $400+ Billion to national debt over the next 10 years.
As Milton Friedman said, “Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.”
Let the mistake rectify itself by allowing it to expire as planned.
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I can’t find any subsidies of any kind at those income levels.
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Dick, I think you get a subsidy because of the 8.5% of Modified Adjusted Gross Income cap on premiums – so, an individual age 64 in Vermont would have a monthly premium of about $1,100, which would be more than 8.5% of their $180,000 gross income once adjusted for the $30,000 deferral to the 401k, and another $5,300 to their Health Savings Account.
Gerrymandered numbers, for sure, but, I don’t think someone with $180,000 of income should have any taxpayer subsidy, no matter the cost of their health coverage.
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more lies by the politicians from both sides of the isle–Trump and his buying votes with the lies sited above and of course the lies promulgated by Obama and his followers (no doubt you) with the $2,500 cost and keeping your doctor–now we are told the programs can’t serve the public unless the subsidy, which had a 5-year life, is extended and folks like you no doubt want it extended forever.
Next big lie will be Medicare for all which you and others will claim will save money, won’t impair the current health system, and serve all of us. You wonder why folks don’t trust government!!
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The president has been remarkably consistent in eventually turning against and abandoning those that enable him, i.e. Roy Coen, Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, John Bolton, Anthony Scaramucci, Mike Pompeo to name a few. Now it’s the American people’s turn.
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