Our current administration claims that this is one of the best outcomes of the Affordable Care Act and that millions of children and young adults now have coverage as a result of this provision.
Now parents can place their adult dependents, up to age 26, on their employer group plans where previously they would have lost coverage. These people would have aged out of their dependent coverage on a family policy or would have lost coverage as a result of graduating from college.
Parents the country over were previously worried about their adult dependents not having access to health insurance. As it turns out, 30% of the uninsured in the U.S. are young adults. This rate is higher than any other age group and is three times higher than the rate of uninsured children.
You’re probably thinking that this is a good thing. Finally someone has passed a law regarding healthcare that makes sense. I just have one issue with this. It seems completely unnecessary.
The Obama administration is claiming that this law makes a large dent in the uninsured population. That might be true, but I honestly believe that we didn’t need to pass legislation to accomplish that, we just needed a better marketing program to let Americans know of the options that already existed. You see, anyone over the age of 18 (or their parents on their behalf) can always just go purchase a health insurance policy with any insurance carrier they like. It had always been that way prior to healthcare reform and continues to be that way now. That’s right, just go buy a policy directly with the insurance carrier or call a health insurance broker.
A large part of the policies we write are on young adults graduating from college or those who aged out of their parents’ policy. Claiming that you have solved a problem that was never a problem in the first place is not very ethical. These adult dependents have always had access to the same policies that everyone else has. Simply get a quote and apply. Just because adult children or their parents have not applied for a private plan, doesn’t mean that they were somehow prohibited from doing so prior to healthcare reform.