{"id":158513,"date":"2024-03-22T14:56:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-22T18:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/?p=158513"},"modified":"2026-09-19T19:00:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-19T23:00:17","slug":"statement-celebrating-the-landmark-affordable-care-act-acas-14-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/?p=158513","title":{"rendered":"STATEMENT: Celebrating the Landmark Affordable Care Act (ACA)’s 14 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally published at Pennsylvania Policy Center<\/a> on March 22, 2024.<\/em><\/p>\n

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE<\/p>\n

March 22, 2024<\/p>\n

CONTACT: Kirstin Snow, Communications Director snow@pennpolicy.org<\/a><\/p>\n

STATEMENT\u00a0ON 14th\u00a0ANNIVERSARY OF THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT<\/p>\n

The landmark Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law fourteen\u00a0years ago on March 23, 2010,\u00a0thanks to President Obama and the commitment of millions of advocates\u2014including 25,000 in Pennsylvania\u2014who worked for years,\u00a0encouraging politicians to address the health insurance industry\u2019s\u00a0abuses and the needs of 50 million Americans who could not afford health insurance.<\/p>\n

As its earlier incarnation, Pennsylvania Policy Center contributed to the victory as part of Health Care for America Now<\/a>\u00a0(HCAN),\u00a0which was led in Pennsylvania by our executive director Marc Stier. Our deputy director, Levana Layendecker, served as the digital director of HCAN nationwide.<\/p>\n

Fourteen years later, we celebrate a great deal of progress while recognizing that there is still much work to do.\u00a0The ACA cut the rate of uninsurance in half nationwide and from 9.7% to 5.3% in Pennsylvania, bringing the number of uninsured people to a record low by making coverage in the ACA marketplaces more affordable and expanding coverage to low-income workers through the expansion of the Medicaid program.<\/p>\n

A record number of Pennsylvanians\u2014419,832\u2014enrolled in ACA coverage this year a 13% increase over last year thanks to enhanced tax credits <\/a>proposed by President Biden that make coverage more affordable\u00a0and save enrollees an average of $800 annually.<\/p>\n

Health disparities between white people and people in minority groups such as Native Americans, Blacks, Latinos, and immigrants have also shrunk because of the Affordable Care Act. These groups were the least likely to have insurance or to be able to afford coverage but have gained increased access thanks to the Medicaid expansion and reduced costs on the exchange.<\/p>\n

The ACA didn\u2019t\u00a0just make coverage affordable and reduce the number of uninsured, it created new rules for insurance corporations that protect all of us from the worst insurance abuses and improve the quality of the coverage. For example, the ACA made it illegal for insurance to deny, drop or overcharge people with common pre-existing conditions like high blood pressure or diabetes\u00a0or pregnancy. The ACA ended annual limits and caps on coverage. It ended discrimination in health insurance by making it illegal to charge women more than men for the same policy\u00a0and\u00a0by refusing coverage to someone because of their race, ethnicity\u00a0or gender. In addition, the ACA created new standards for insurance policies that require all plans sold in the ACA marketplaces to include basic Essential Health Benefits<\/a>\u00a0like maternal and prenatal care, prescription drugs, and hospital care. The ACA also made preventive care like birth control, annual exams, mammograms,\u00a0and colonoscopies free under all health plans,\u00a0including Medicare.<\/p>\n

The ACA has had a dramatic effect on the well-being of Pennsylvanians, reducing illness and medical bankruptcy. And, research shows that each year the ACA saves the lives of between 200 and 400 Pennsylvanians who would have otherwise died for lack of health insurance.<\/p>\n

All of\u00a0these features made the ACA the biggest achievement in healthcare since the 1960s passage of Medicare and Medicaid\u2014but there\u2019s still significant work to do to rein in\u00a0insurance and drug corporations\u00a0that continue to price gouge on premiums and medicines and to ensure that people in the states that have not expanded Medicaid get access to those benefits.<\/p>\n

Moreover, there are some politicians, including former President Trump<\/a>, who have not given up on repealing the law,\u00a0and there continue to be court cases that try to dismantle the law piece by piece. Advocates must stay vigilant to protect and finish implementing the law.<\/p>\n

Marc Stier, Pennsylvania Policy Center\u2019s executive director and former state director of HCAN in Pennsylvania, said today, \u201cThe enactment of the ACA, thanks to the work of the HCAN campaign, remains a proud moment in my life as well as that of advocates throughout the state. And like any other Pennsylvanian, I can see the results close to home. My daughter has taken advantage of both the Medicaid expansion and health insurance in the ACA marketplace. And, two of our current staff members received what one called \u2018unbelievably affordable\u2019 coverage through the ACA marketplace that \u2018saved me in the aftermath of the Great Recession\u201d before joining us.\u201d<\/p>\n

###<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally published at Pennsylvania Policy Center on March 22, 2024. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 22, 2024 CONTACT: Kirstin Snow, Communications Director snow@pennpolicy.org STATEMENT\u00a0ON 14th\u00a0ANNIVERSARY OF THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT The landmark Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law fourteen\u00a0years ago on March 23, 2010,\u00a0thanks to President Obama and the commitment of millions of advocates\u2014including 25,000 in Pennsylvania\u2014who worked for years,\u00a0encouraging politicians to address the health insurance industry\u2019s\u00a0abuses and the needs of 50 million Americans who could not afford health insurance. As its earlier incarnation, Pennsylvania Policy Center contributed to the victory as part of Health Care for America Now\u00a0(HCAN),\u00a0which was led in Pennsylvania by our executive director Marc Stier. Our deputy director, Levana Layendecker, served as the digital director of HCAN nationwide. Fourteen years later, we celebrate a great deal of progress while recognizing that there is still much work to do.\u00a0The ACA cut the rate of uninsurance in\u2026 Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1896,"featured_media":158512,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[291,288,289],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-post","category-penn-policy-center","category-statement-penn-policy-center"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p35YuU-FeF","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ACAIMAGE-4.png?fit=1200%2C628&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1896"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=158513"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158513\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158747,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158513\/revisions\/158747"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/158512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=158513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=158513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcstier.com\/blog2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=158513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}