WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — The central provision of Obamacare — the new health-insurance marketplaces — is scheduled to debut in less than a week. Yet after four years of debate and discussion about the Affordable Care Act, many Americans have little idea about what the new health-care law does.
It’s not surprising that many people would be confused about it. Most of us don’t quite understand how our current health-care insurance system works . Obamacare is new, and it’s complicated. And conservative groups have spent hundreds of millions of dollars over the past four years spreading misinformation and lies about it. Read more from The Wall Street Journal: The Health Law: Separating Fact From Fiction.
Here are five things you may not know about Obamacare, even if you’ve heard the disinformation campaign loud and clear:
It’s not really ‘Obamacare’: The law doesn’t reform health care as much as it reforms health insurance. That is, it doesn’t change health care; it changes the way it’s paid for. The law’s nickname really should be “Obama Insurance.”
You’ve seen the ads that portray Barack Obama — or a creepy Uncle Sam — as a doctor. That’s a lie. Under Obamacare, doctors, nurses and other trained professionals will do their jobs pretty much as they do now. Decisions about medical treatment will be between you and your provider, and bureaucrats will have less say over your care than they do now. Learn more about the Health Exchange on MarketWatch. ut neither is it true, as Obama has said, that “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.” Maybe you can, and maybe you can’t — it will depend on which doctors are covered under your insurance policy, and whether your doctor will take your insurance. You don’t have a guarantee now that your employer won’t change or abolish your insurance plan, and that won’t change under Obamacare.
But here’s the big change: If you lose your job, or if your employer does get rid of your insurance, you’ll be able to buy another policy on the new health-insurance exchanges.
It’ll be affordable: One of the biggest concerns about Obamacare was the worry that insurance premiums would go through the roof. It now looks as if those fears were overblown.
Despite giving as many as 30 million Americans access to health insurance, Obamacare is expected to increase total national health-care spending by just 0.1% per year, according to the actuaries at Medicare.
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, premiums in the health-insurance exchanges will be lower than expected when the law was written, ranging from $97 a month for a 40-year-old in Hartford, Conn., to $168 in Sioux Falls, S.D., after tax credits and subsidies.
In some states, premiums for policies purchased through the exchanges will be much more expensive than individual coverage is now, in part because the law requires insurance policies to offer better benefits, including coverage for pre-existing medical conditions and more comprehensive preventive care.
And some people who get their insurance through their job will pay more because their policy will be better. You’ll get more for your money.
It’s not a train wreck: The rollout of Obamacare hasn’t exactly been smooth. But it’s not the disaster that many on the right are praying for.
