Pros and Cons of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

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Recommended: The background of the Affordable Care Act

Just mention the word "Obamacare" and a heated debate will start right away. The legal name of Obamacare is "the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, PPACA" (Tate 1). The law has over 2500 pages and many have not read the entire law (Tate 12). Democrat Nancy Pelosi made an infamous remark back in 2010 stating "that Congress '[has] to pass the bill so you can find out what's in it'"...(Roff). This law was signed in March of 2010 and has a 54% disapproval rating among Americans today (Amadeo). The main goals of the law are to offer healthcare to all Americans, stop the rising costs of insurance, increase the number of "consumer benefits and protection", and solve several other healthcare concerns (Tate 13-15). What are some of the pros and cons of PPACA, and is this law good or bad for our country at this time? The pros of PPACA include providing insurance to the "32 million" people that do not have insurance (Amadeo). These are the people who consistently show up in the "emergency room" and usually do not pay their bill, creating a rise in the cost of health insurance for everyone else (Amadeo). The law requires all insurance plans to cover certain preventative care in order to diagnose illnesses before they reach the costly state (Amadeo). PPACA also makes coverage available to those with pre-existing conditions (Amadeo). This has been an issue in the insurance industry because of adverse selection, which is caused when insurance is purchased by those who will use more than what they are paying (Stone 85). Insurance companies would off-set their costs by offering several plans with different deductibles or co-pays based on asymmetric information (85). PPACA will protect individuals from cost increases because of a pre-existing condition (Tate 14). The cons of PPACA include an eventual increase in the cost of healthcare because of the increase in the number of individuals receiving preventative care. This is based on a study done by the Congressional Budget Office in 2009, which concluded this increase "will lead to higher net medical spending" (Amadeo). The increased number of benefits actually causes the cost curve to rise (Tate 122,123). PPACA will impose a tax on those individuals that do not have insurance by the deadline in 2014, and the tax will increase each year (Amadeo). PPACA also requires insurance plans to cover ten specific health concerns or it fails to meet their criteria (Amadeo).

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