Providing “confirmation that California is making the Affordable Care Act work,” a U.S. Census report found that the state’s uninsured rate dropped to 12.4 percent in 2014.
That’s off considerably from the 17.2 percent of 2013, the last year before Obamacare coverage went into effect.
Nationwide, the percentage of those without health insurance came in at 10.4 percent, compared with 2013’s 13.3 percent.
The U.S. Census Bureau data ranked California fifth in percentage of decline.
“Up until now we’ve relied on surveys and reports from foundations and other groups to understand the impact of the Affordable Care Act,” said Covered California chief Peter Lee. “The Census figures are the gold standard, and what the numbers show is that California is having one of the largest impacts in the nation on reducing the rate of the uninsured.”
Lee said the federal report means that “whether the Affordable Care Act is working should no longer be the subject of debate.”
Nationally, the Census report said, “Hispanics had the lowest rate of health insurance coverage in 2014, at just over 80 percent.” That factors heavily in the state’s uninsured rate being 2 percentage points higher than the national average, with Hispanics becoming the largest racial or ethnic group in the state in 2014.
Non-Hispanic Whites had a higher rate of health insurance coverage nationally (92.4 percent) compared with blacks, Asians, and Hispanics.
Massachusetts (3.3 percent) had the nation’s lowest uninsured rate, while the highest was in Texas (19.1 percent).
The latest federal numbers for 2015 show California has the largest state enrollment under an Affordable Care Act marketplace — just under 1.4 million — as of the end of June.
Enrollment for 2016 begins Nov. 1.
Read the report “Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2014.”
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