Research And Statistics

ACA marketplace and Medicaid coverage is helping to end long bouts without insurance, bridge gaps when employer insurance is lost, and improve access to health care. Sixty-one percent of enrollees who had used their insurance to get care said they would not have been able to afford or access it prior to enrolling. Doctor availability and appointment wait times are similar to those reported by insured Americans overall. Majorities with marketplace or Medicaid coverage continue to be satisfied with their insurance. The NCS is also evaluating provisions that are identified in the law but not fully implemented, such as the Cadillac tax. The NCS will continue to research, listen, and identify other opportunities to accommodate the changing health benefits landscape in line with the goal of answering customer’s questions about workers’ pay and benefits.

By creating liability for both debt collectors and their clients, GLBA and HIPAA demand that privacy and security be top priorities in the credit and collection industry. Debt collectors must follow specific federal guidelines that establish consumers’ rights and collectors’ responsibilities, including laws such as the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and the Fair Credit Reporting Act . Many of these laws contain data security and confidentiality provisions. Broken out by both market category (credit cards, student loans, healthcare, etc.) and service type (primary, secondary, purchased, legal, etc.), this survey provides vital statistics and key figures. CMS developed the QHP Enrollee Survey to assess enrollees’ experiences with QHPs offered through the Exchanges.

The details for viewing and downloading the data from the server are provided in other areas of the documentation and are beyond the scope of this ACA unit. Even so, it is useful to at least describe the steps you would perform to access and download the data from the Web, estimate the part-worth utilities, and begin analysis using the market simulator. Before we examine or fine tune those ACA questions, let’s turn our attention to the issue of assigning passwords for respondents to enter at the opening screen of a Lighthouse survey. Findings from a new survey conducted in the last two months of 2017 mark the Commonwealth Fund’s sixth snapshot of public opinion regarding the healthcare landscape. Federal efforts to dismantle the ACAover the past year have stoked uncertainty among those who receive their coverage through the exchanges or under the Medicaid program. Americans broadly support the right to affordable healthcare, according to the Commonwealth Fund.

• Conference workgroups discussed provisions of the ACA that have the potential to affect the levels and trends of health care premiums, coverage, and provisions.
• An additional concern explored was potential disruptions in the availability of coverage data, data that was widely available prior to the ACA, by plan and occupation.
• The conference explored potential changes to the way the NCS collects and analyzes costs for health care benefits and provisions.
• Variable premiums based on age, smoking status, wellness, and other factors could be more prevalent.
• Further, relevant ACA provisions were tested to determine their potential impact on current and future NCS health care cost and provision estimates.
• Special attention was paid to the ACA provisions deemed most likely to influence employers’ decisions to offer health insurance, workers’ decisions to accept such insurance, and the terms under which such insurance is offered.

At the same time, a substantial number of individuals with health plans through the ACA and Medicaid are pessimistic that their current coverage will continue. More than 190 professionals provided feedback, including healthcare administrators and facilities leaders, architects and academics. Providers are excited about opportunities to improve while worried about the transition underway, according to the survey. Nearly four out of five, or 79 percent, say health reform is creating significant uncertainty for their organizations and the healthcare industry. Sevety-four percent predict it will challenge their organization’s financial condition with 72 percent saying it already has. The providers did not make an unqualified endorsement of the ACA, however, according to a statement on the survey.

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After a short hands-on demonstration of the new foam core tires, they sit down to computers connected to the Web and take the survey. At the end of each session, you ask each respondent follow-up questions to ensure that there weren’t any parts that were difficult to understand or just didn’t make sense.

The combination of internal research and feedback from listening activities led to small-scale testing of how changes related to the ACA might affect data collection. The effects of different ACA provisions on what the NCS collects vary widely, with some confronting the core goals of the NCS. For example, the program had to examine how penalties , taxes on robust plans, , and subsidies might impact employer costs for providing health benefits. Other complications arising from the ACA provisions included whether to collect the incidence of grandfathered plans9 and the availability of detailed information on variable premiums. It was important that the NCS response to these issues balance the program’s goal of providing detailed data with its concerns about both respondent burden and collection feasibility.

Policy Brief: With Nongroup Premiums Rising Sharply, Several Proposals To Reduce Premium Growth Have Strong Support

In addition to the ECI and ECEC, the NCS collects and publishes extensive data on employer-provided benefits, with an emphasis on health care and retirement. For the September 2014 reference period, the NCS collected data from 10,200 establishments in the United States representing private industry, as well as state and local governments. Kaiser said the “clear majority” of support is the highest in more than 100 polls the nonprofit health foundation has conducted. The ACA was signed into law in 2010 by President Barack Obama and has expanded health insurance coverage to more than 20 million Americans. This series of Commonwealth Fund surveys tracks the implementation and impact of the Affordable Care Act’s coverage expansions. Recent analysis of the survey finding showed that, for people with low and moderate incomes, the Affordable Care Act’s tax credits have made premium costs roughly comparable to those paid by people with job-based health insurance. The survey was conducted by Morning Consult on Jan. 25 and 26 among a national sample of 1,890 adults.

In March 2014, the average monthly employer premium paid for all civilian workers contributing to medical coverage was $377.84 for single coverage and $913.77 for family coverage. (See table 2.) Employers paid, on average, 81 percent of health insurance premiums for workers selecting single coverage and 69 percent of premiums for workers selecting family coverage. The employer-provided benefit with the largest average cost is health insurance. (See table 1.) In September 2014, health benefits accounted for 8.5 percent of total compensation paid to civilian workers and 27.3 percent of employer benefit costs overall. I’ve written about health care for three decades, starting from my native Iowa where I covered the presidential campaign bus rides of Bill and Hillary Clinton through the Hawkeye state talking health reform and the economy. I have covered the rise, fall and rise again of health reform, chronicling national trends as well as the influence of Barack and Michelle Obama from Chicago’s South Side on changes to the U.S. health system from my base in Chicago. I am the author of the book, “Inside Obamacare.” A regular on Forbes on Fox ( ), you can see me on occasion nationally on Fox Business News.

For example, of the private-industry workers participating in medical plans in 2013, 80 percent had coverage for outpatient mental health care. For private-industry workers with outpatient prescription-drug coverage, 80 percent required a copayment for generic drugs. The median copayment for generic drug prescriptions was $10 per prescription. QuickTakes provide information on health insurance coverage, access to and use of health care, health care affordability, and self-reported health status, as well as quick data on important implementation issues under the ACA. Next, you recruit six mountain biking enthusiasts within your city to come to a central site to see a demonstration of the new foam tire technology and take the survey.

The Affordable Care Act And Patient Satisfaction In Hospitals

You ask them specifically about the ACA sections, making sure that they understood what to do at each stage of the survey, and that they didn’t feel overwhelmed by the task. After debriefing the test respondents and analyzing their data to ensure that the results look reasonable, you make a few small adjustments and proceed to field. The NCS produces both the quarterly Employment Cost Index and the Employer Costs for Employee Compensation . The ECI, a Principal Federal Economic Indicator, captures compensation cost changes in the United States; and the ECEC provides employer cost levels for employee wages and salaries and 18 individual benefits.

Starting in March 2015, the NCS initiated the collection of data on the ACA grandfathered status of health insurance plans. Accurately responding to more detailed survey questions proved difficult for respondents. In an attempt to capture variable premium data, regional field economists attempted to collect data for specific cases, such as the premium rate for a 40-year-old male smoker. However, these specific cases caused problems for respondents, with few being able to provide the premium rates for particular types of individuals. Similarly, few survey respondents could give the actuarial value of their plans, and many were confused by the concept.

A better understood health system may save someone some money or their life. Although support for a government-run healthcare system has edged up in the past five years, the majority of Americans continue to prefer a system based on private health insurance. Nearly 400 healthcare providers responded to the Affordable Care Act Survey between December 2014 and February 2015, answering questions about how their opinion on health reform has changed since it was signed into law in March 2010. If the Supreme Court overturns the ACA, a host of provisions could be eliminated, including the law’s protections for people with pre-existing medical conditions. These provisions prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage based on a person’s medical history and prohibit insurance companies from charging those with pre-existing conditions more for coverage .

Industry Research And Statistics

As part of its research efforts on the ACA, the NCS identified potential implications for both data collection and estimation. Some of the ACA mandates that affect employers have not yet gone into effect, so how employers will respond is unknown. This led the NCS to pursue outreach opportunities, including attending meetings and hosting a conference, to gather more input on potential changes to employer-provided health care costs and coverage. These sessions brought together experts and survey stakeholders who provided feedback on how the ACA provisions could affect data collection. The approach has included researching the details of the law and evolving regulations, listening to the suggestions and concerns of stakeholders, and testing collection of new data elements.

The conference explored potential changes to the way the NCS collects and analyzes costs for health care benefits and provisions. Special attention was paid to the ACA provisions deemed most likely to influence employers’ decisions to offer health insurance, workers’ decisions to accept such insurance, and the terms under which such insurance is offered. Conference workgroups discussed provisions of the ACA that have the potential to affect the levels and trends of health care premiums, coverage, and provisions. Variable premiums based on age, smoking status, wellness, and other factors could be more prevalent.

An additional concern explored was potential disruptions in the availability of coverage data, data that was widely available prior to the ACA, by plan and occupation. Further, relevant ACA provisions were tested to determine their potential impact on current and future NCS health care cost and provision estimates. Potential changes to the NCS were recommended only if they improved the accuracy of the collected data or the collection process without overburdening survey respondents. Moreover, efforts to continue tracking any legislative, executive, or judicial actions that may change or delay the effect of the law are ongoing. The National Compensation Survey is a program within the Bureau of Labor Statistics that provides comprehensive measures of employer costs for worker’s compensation based on an establishment survey. The survey also tracks the incidence and provisions2 of employer-provided benefits for workers. This article provides an overview of efforts to research the effects of the ACA on NCS cost, coverage, and provisions data, including obtaining expert feedback and testing selected elements for potential inclusion in future data collection.

Utilizing data from the 2016 QHP Enrollee Survey, CMS conducted a pilot test of displaying quality ratings on healthcare.gov. The other crucial reason for coverage increase is Medicaid expansion in 37 states and Washington, D.C.

Interviews were conducted online, and the data were weighted to approximate a target sample of adults based on age, race/ethnicity, gender, educational attainment and region. Results from the full survey have a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

There are partisan differences on both questions, with the majority of Democrats and independents saying they don’t want the Court to overturn the ACA or pre-existing condition protections. However, among Republicans, three-fourths (76%) say they want to see the ACA overturned, but two-thirds say they do not want to see pre-existing condition protections overturned. For instance, only 61 percent of adults knew that many people would lose coverage through Medicaid or subsidies for private health insurance if the A.C.A. were repealed and no replacement enacted. In contrast, approximately one in six Americans, or 16 percent, said that “coverage through Medicaid and subsidies that help people buy private health insurance would not be affected” by repeal, and 23 percent did not know. Before showing any conjoint questions, we need to ask respondents to rate the levels within any attributes that we don’t know ahead of time the rational preference order. We also specify control settings regarding the attribute importance question that follows the level ratings. Uninsured rates in the past three years have fallen most steeply for low-income adults though remain higher compared to wealthier adults.

Aca Biennial Member Survey Results

In Chicago, you can hear my health segments and business analysis on WBBM News Radio 780 and 105.9 FM. I’ve written for many media outlets, including the New York Times ( ) and was healthcare reporter at the Chicago Tribune ( ). Prior to that, I wrote for Modern Healthcare and several Iowa newspapers including the Des Moines Register. I’m active in education and teach in the University of Iowa School of Journalism MA in Strategic Communication program. I am passionate about health literacy when it comes to explaining the complexities of health care.

The conference provided a wealth of information on changes to employer-provided health care likely to arise from the implementation of the ACA. In addition, conference participants acquired a greater understanding of the NCS and its extensive breadth of compensation data. The knowledge gained by conference attendees will increase awareness of the survey. The NCS continues to pursue opportunities to meet with external partners to learn more about what employers are doing to both comply with the ACA and manage costs for providing health insurance to their workers. Because of the monitoring of news and trends related to employer-provided benefits, NCS recognized early on that the ACA had the potential to significantly change many facets of the health care market. Given that the NCS is primarily concerned with capturing the costs, coverage, and provisions of employee compensation, research was narrowly focused on the legislation’s effect on employer-provided health benefits.

The July 2019 KFF Health Tracking Poll found that a majority of the public says it is very important for many of the ACA provisions to be kept in place, including the guaranteed issue provision (72%) and community rating (64%). While partisans divide over the importance of keeping many provisions of the ACA in place, majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independence say it is very important to continue each of these protections for people with pre-existing conditions. In the survey, 35 percent of respondents said either they thought Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act were different policies or didn’t know if they were the same or different . This confusion was more pronounced among people 18 to 29 and those who earn less than $50,000 — two groups that could be significantly affected by repeal. Thirty respondents are brought to the field facility, shown the solid foam tire prototype, and complete the survey. The completed data reside on Sawtooth Software’s hosting service servers.

The complexity and scope of the ACA required that the NCS review the impact of the law in a deliberate and formal way. Considering the relative importance of health benefits on employer costs for employee compensation, the NCS has closely examined the provisions of the ACA. In particular, the NCS is concerned with how the ACA will affect the data collection, accuracy, and analysis of employer provided health costs and provisions available through employer provided health insurance. In addition to employer costs data, the NCS also publishes detailed health provisions data on medical care, dental care, vision care, and outpatient prescription-drug coverage.

The Affordable Care Act , signed into law in 2010 to help extend health insurance coverage to millions of Americans, mandates various requirements to employers providing health care benefit coverage to workers. While some agencies are focused on the implementation, regulation, and enforcement aspects of the ACA, the NCS is interested in identifying how the law will affect providing labor statistics for its economic measures. The conference included plenary sessions and workgroups, which gave participants an understanding of the scope and outputs of the NCS. More than 40 people attended from various government agencies, private consulting firms, think tanks, academia, and BLS national and regional offices. The goal of the conference was to explore the relationship between certain ACA provisions and NCS products, specifically the ECI.

ADP’s recent ACA survey reveals there is significant confusion about what the ACA requires, how to comply with the law’s eligibility and affordability provisions, and what reports to send when. For example, almost 90 percent of respondents did not know how long employers have to respond to an IRS penalty notification, specifically IRS Letter 226J. To measure the annual impacts of third-party debt collection on the national and state economies, ACA International commissioned Kaulkin Ginsberg Company to conduct a survey and prepare a report base on the most recently available economic data. ACA has compiled research and statistics from a variety of industry sources in response to frequent questions regarding the credit and collection industry. All sources are cited and every effort has been made to ensure that the information is correct. 2 The term provisions throughout the article refers to NCS data elements related to a particular type of plan, service, condition, premium, or potential cost for health care.