![[OC] Obamacare Coverage and Premium Increases if Enhanced Subsidies Aren’t Renewed](https://www.byteseu.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/f213tpv1b11g1-1024x833.jpg "[OC] Obamacare Coverage and Premium Increases if Enhanced Subsidies Aren’t Renewed")
From my blog, see link for full analysis: https://polimetrics.substack.com/p/enhanced-obamacare-subsidies-expire
Data from KFF.org. Graphic made with Datawrapper.
Enhanced Obamacare subsidies expire December 31st. I mapped the premium increases by congressional district, and the political geography is really interesting.
Many ACA Marketplace enrollees live in Republican congressional districts, and most are in states Trump won in 2024. These are also the districts facing the steepest premium increases if Congress doesn’t act.
Why? Red states that refused Medicaid expansion pushed millions into the ACA Marketplace. Enrollment in non-expansion states has grown 188% since 2020 compared to 65% in expansion states.
The map shows what happens to a 60-year-old couple earning $82,000 (just above the subsidy eligibility cutoff). Wyoming districts see premium increases of 400-597%. Southern states see 200-400% increases. That couple goes from paying around $580/month to $3,400/month in some areas.
If subsidies expire, the CBO estimates 3.8 million more Americans become uninsured. Premiums will rise further as healthy people drop coverage. 24 million Americans are currently enrolled in Marketplace plans, and 22 million receive enhanced subsidies.
Posted by Public_Finance_Guy
31 Comments
I don’t know anyone enrolled in “Obamacare”. I know people enrolled under the ACA though.
Check out the third picture, then realize that 72% of Wyoming voted for Trump.
Ah yes, the orange color that means a number somewhere between 20 and 597. So useful.
I have no idea how I would have survived the past decade without the ACA. I’d put it up there with the interstate highway system and the moon landing.
In the 3rd slide, including Alaska and Hawaii at such low percentages makes the rest of the color scale hard to understand. I would have liked to have seen the map with those excluded.
I use it. Next year my wife and I are throwing the idea of just not having health insurance for the time being.
I’m using this calculator (looks like the same source):
[https://www.kff.org/interactive/calculator-aca-enhanced-premium-tax-credit/](https://www.kff.org/interactive/calculator-aca-enhanced-premium-tax-credit/)
And getting nothing like your info.
I did a 60-year old couple in Wyoming making $82,000 and got in increase on a silver plan from $560/mo to $681/mo. Bronze plans are still free whether or not the subsidies come back or not.
Is this calculator just way off?
Your color gradient is bad and you should feel bad
Curious why Utah is so high? Wonder if it has anything to do with Romney as ACA was born from Romneycare in MA
Lol that gradient scale on the last map. 20 to 597 is wild.
It’s what they voted for. Good for them
“It hurt itself in its confusion.”
The piece people are missing here is how much premiums are going up in 2026 across all of healthcare. 18% increases in one year is insane. That is 18% increase before millions of healthy young people drop off next year. With or without those enhanced subsidies, a plan for a couple shouldn’t cost $30k/year under any scenario. ACA needs a rehaul.
It’s even more stunning that insurance companies are pulling out of ACA because they are either losing money or seeing very slim margins.
Republicans love to hurt themselves and blame the Democrats. It’s a disease
missouri adopted the expansion by refereundum but the legislators gave it a budget of $0.
See those random yellow states that generally vote conservative? Those are medicaid expansion states lmao. I was confused because KY has a very good marketplace platform called Kynect so I expected more people to be on it, but then remembered we are an expansion state.
I worked at a KY medicaid and SNAP office for a long time, a shitload of white conservative rednecks are on medicaid and simultaneously hate “obamacare” lmfao.
edit: damn I wrote this whole ass comment before reading OP’s description that basically says the same thing but better.
I’m not looking to turn this into a political argument.
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but my rudimentary understanding of the subsidies, using your example, is that the plan costs $3400/month and this couple pays $580 while the Gov pays the remaining $2820.
So if the insurance companies lose a combined 22M+ subsidies at $2500 a piece (not real numbers), wouldn’t that a loss of $55B to their collective bottom lines? With that much loss, it seems like that would have to lower their premiums to get more folks to sign up.
Again, not looking for a political argument/fight, just holes in my thinking.
Texas just weakened their districts and are looking to piss off their base…interesting strategy.
Texas and Florida hit hardest you say…
The scale on the last map could be improved.
I’m seeing a lot of the population that should get ready to pull themselves up by their boot straps
MAGA (probably): its fine because we are making trillions of dollars with tarriffs
Crazy how it’s all the states you’d expect
I live in new jersey. I just missed out on open enrollment for my job. I went to check the marketplace and the Affordable Care Act all of that, and I absolutely cannot afford insurance. I just can’t. But I don’t qualify for free health care. And New Jersey taxes us when we don’t have health care. So come april, I will owe about a thousand dollars for not being able to afford the $1,400 a year that my health insurance would cost through the marketplace. Suicide is becoming cuter and cuter every day.
Can someone please inform me of what the angle in removing these subsidies?
Obviously “conservatism” in the USA is a talking point and not something most Congressmen believe.
But what are the wanna be oligarchs trying to accomplish here? Are they stupid to believe enough to believe that people will be forced off the ACA and then pay for private health insurance? I would imagine most people would just remain uninsured, go to a hospital, and then never pay the bill.
This would cause people to be turned away from treatment and dying. I just don’t see the end goal of this. Why would someone choose a private insurer, pay an obscene amount of money, and probably just get stuck with a high deductible plan anyway in which they pay for literally everything out of pocket anyway? Just to have a failsafe in case they get cancer?
Sure I get some of this is to abolish the ACA, but again to what end? Just because “government spending bad?”. Just doesn’t make sense to me.
The south absolutely, categorically cannot help but keep fucking itself. It’s like watching a friend with an addiction, and it’s sad.
no one fucks over republican voters like republicans
People say I’m nuts when I say Texas and Florida are going Democrat in 2026, but look at this shit for yourself, they are just getting absolutely medical insurance raped out the arse. And this just the latest Republican fuck you those states.
Surreal seeing the south constantly voting against their best interests.
Thanks for doing this. I was looking for an overview beyond the extreme cases making headlines.
I’d be curious to see the average increase by congressional district regardless of income. Obviously districts have different demographics and income levels, so it would be interesting to see it mapped that way.