Enrollment In Obamacare Reaches A Record High With 2 Million More Americans Signing Up

President Joe Biden reopened enrollment to the Affordable Care Act exchanges, better known as Obamacare, on February 15, and since then, more than two million Americans have signed up for 2021 coverage on federal and state exchanges, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The federal exchange deadline is set to end on August 15 while various states have set up their own deadlines. So far, 1.5 million people have signed up on the federal exchange level and more than 600,000 have signed up for different policies in the 14 states and the District of Columbia which run their own exchanges.

With Democrats passing their $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, those who have signed up for the insurance have also been able to choose policies that cost $10 or less per month. Two major changes have been made to Obamacare. Employees do not have to pay more than 8.5% of their income toward coverage and lower-income policyholders can eliminate their premiums altogether through subsidies.

The newest addition: those who earn more than 400% of the federal poverty are eligible for the ACA.

Because of those changes and the fact that many Americans lost job-based coverage during the pandemic, enrollment in Obamacare is now at a record high. The only time enrollment was higher was when 12.7 million people signed up for Obamacare plans in 2016.

Article by Gabrielle Guz