Policy Research

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Care Consumer Confidence Index (RWJF Index) found that Americans’ confidence in their health insurance coverage and ability to access health care increased slightly last month.

The employer-based healthcare system has existed in America since World War II and is considered by many to be the bedrock of the nation’s health insurance system. To shore up this system and to extend coverage for those not currently insured, numerous health policy experts have argued for an “employer mandate” requiring employers to contribute to coverage for their workers.

With an estimated 29.3 percent of Americans age 19 to 29 lacking coverage, young adults are more likely to be uninsured than any other age group. Many policy-makers and advocates have ideas about how to insure this group, including enacting a federal statute to expand dependent coverage.

The concept of requiring people to acquire health insurance has drawn criticism from some on the right—who see it as a coercive intrusion by the federal government—and some on the left—who view it as a giveaway to insurance companies. Proponents of current legislation, however, view the individual mandate as both a necessary cost-control provision and a key step towards universal coverage.

The Alliance for Health Reform held briefing sessions on the anticipated 2009 Congressional debate on health care reform. The sessions prepared staff of congressional committees with primary jurisdiction over health care policy for the debate.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Care Consumer Confidence Index (RWJF Index) found that Americans’ confidence in health care dropped in November but remained mostly consistent throughout 2009. Over 2009, an average of one in four Americans each month (26.5%) worried that they would lose health care coverage and nearly half (48.3%) worried that they would not be able to afford future health care needs if they or a family member became seriously ill.

Between 2000 and 2004, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academy of Sciences, Washington, studied how the lack of health insurance affects individuals, families, communities and the nation and produced and disseminated six reports analyzing these consequences.

Key Results
The project accomplished the following:

• The IOM produced six reports analyzing how the lack of insurance coverage aff...

In a new report funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Urban Institute researchers Linda Blumberg and Stacey McMorrow conclude that the health insurance exchanges proposed in both the House and Senate bills, along with associated insurance market reforms, will substantially improve the ability of small employers to obtain affordable coverage.

The report also provides state-by-state estimates of the effects of the legislation on overall health insurance coverage rates (for both rural and urban persons), as well as estimates of how the previously uninsured would be covered under the provisions of the legislation.

The Urban Institute looks at how various health reform bills make the trade-off between government costs and affordability for low- and middle-income families.