Health insurance still not affordable for many

One of the goals of the Affordable Care Act (colloquially known as "Obamacare") was to make health insurance affordable to everyone. This was an important part of the legislation since insurers could no longer deny insurance coverage to people (or charge more) simply because those individuals have pre-existing conditions. To make it financially viable for insurance plans, large numbers of people without medical conditions would need to enroll in the plans in order to offset the known costs of many individuals who had expensive pre-existing conditions. Otherwise, the insurance premium could spiral upwards as smaller insurance pools raise premiums to cover some pre-existing conditions, causing some people who don't have pre-existing conditions to drop out for financial reasons, which in turn, might cause the premiums to rise even more. The legislation, however, did very little to directly try and control costs.

Unfortunately, it appears that health insurance is still out of reach for many lower-income individuals. The tax for not having adequate insurance starts small and is legislated to increase over the years, causing insurance to look more attractive over time. Merely increasing the penalty may simply apply more financial pressure on those who cannot afford insurance. Instead, one long-term trend that is more likely to be helpful is the development and adoption of tools that help consumers better evaluate value when considering medical procedures. If consumers are able to increasingly choose higher value options, then the underlying costs might actually become mitigated, resulting in lower insurance premiums.