On Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released the January enrollment numbers for the ACA and it can only be seen as good news. In the month of January, 1.1 million people signed up for a health plan using the state and federal marketplaces. This represented a 53% increase in total enrollment over the previous three months. Overall, 3.3 million people have now signed up for health plans in the marketplaces since enrollment began in October. With enrollment open until March 31st, it seems clear now that we will see millions more enroll in this first year.
One concern many have had in the early stages of enrollment was regarding young people signing up. Well, that fear has now been somewhat alleviated, as 27% of those who signed up in January were young adults. Overall, 25% of the total number of people enrolled are between the ages of 18 and 34. So the fear that only older adults would be seeking coverage in the individual marketplaces now seems unfounded. Young, healthy adults are making up a good-sized portion of those covered.
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Senate Democrats were ecstatic with the news on Wednesday and sent out the following tweet.
BREAKING: Obamacare enrollment continues to grow — nearly 1.1 million people signed up for plans in January. pic.twitter.com/eWPHUXX821
— Senate Democrats (@SenateDems) February 12, 2014
Of course, despite the continued good news regarding Obamacare and the fact that the American people have shown that they actually want it, Republicans continued to hammer at the health care law that is helping millions of people receive affordable health coverage, many for the first time in their lives. Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) tweeted out a video showing more Obamacare ‘horror’ stories.
New video highlights disastrous impact of #ObamaCare on #OH8 #smallbiz: http://t.co/a8gLSCepZD
— Speaker John Boehner (@SpeakerBoehner) February 12, 2014
Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) decided to tweet out some straight BS about how Obamacare has created a part-time workforce, which has already been debunked many times over.
ObamaCare has caused the 40 hr work week to go down to 30 hrs. That’s a 25% decrease in people’s take-home checks. http://t.co/HdlpIyBYEM
— Eric Cantor (@GOPLeader) February 12, 2014
You’d think that the unemployment rate going down, and more full-time jobs being added every month, Cantor would be convinced that Obamacare is not a ‘job killer’ nor creating a ‘part-time nation’, but I guess you need to keep going with what you know. Right?
Justin Baragona is the Managing Editor at Politicus Sports as well as Senior Editor at PoliticusUSA. He was a political writer for 411Mania.com before joining PoliticusUSA. Politically, Justin considers himself a liberal but also a realist and pragmatist. Currently, Justin lives in St. Louis, MO and is married. Besides writing, he also runs his own business after spending a number of years in the corporate world. You can follow Justin on Twitter either with his personal handle (@justinbaragona) or the Sports site’s (@PoliticusSports).
