Perilous
Times
50 million in U.S. lack health insurance
Number of people without health insurance climbs
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The number of people who lacked health
insurance last year climbed to 49.9 million, up from 49 million in
2009, the Census Bureau said Tuesday.
Three groups comprised the bulk of the uninsured in 2010,
including foreign-born residents who are not U.S. citizens, young
adults ages 19 to 25 and low-income families with an annual
household income of less than $25,000.
Much of the declines in insured rates in recent years can be
attributed to the loss of employer-provided coverage, which fell
amid sustained unemployment and as employers continued to cut back
on benefits.
The percentage of people who had health insurance through their
employers fell to 55.3% in 2010 from 56.1% the year before,
continuing a long, downward trend. In 2000, 64.1% of the
population received health insurance through their employers.
"As the job market remains weak, Americans can no longer depend on
their workplace for consistent affordable coverage," said Elise
Gould, Director of Health Policy Research for the Economic Policy
Institute, a Washington-based think tank.
Poverty on the rise
Some employers have stopped offering health insurance, while
others are passing along more of the cost to their employees, said
Gould. As a result, some workers are abandoning their employer's
plans because the premiums have become too expensive, she said.
The average health insurance premium for family coverage has more
than doubled over the past decade to $13,770 a year, according to
the Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-profit which focuses on health
care policy and issues.
0:00 / 3:09 Stuck in American chronic poverty
With fewer Americans receiving health care coverage through their
employers, government-funded programs like Medicare, Medicaid,
military health care, the Children's Health Care Program (CHIPS)
and coverage offered by various states have had to pick up the
slack.
In 2010, 31% of Americans relied on the government for health
insurance, up from 24.2% in 1999.
Many of the new government beneficiaries are children, according
to Gould. Still, Census reported that 9.8% of children under age
18 are uninsured despite the government programs targeting them
like CHIPS and Medicaid, which is also open to their parents.
Adults without dependent children, however, are not eligible for
Medicaid in most states under federal rules, said Rachel Garfield,
a senior researcher on the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the
Uninsured. It's this group that accounts for a large portion of
the increase in the uninsured.
Nearly one-in-four working-age adults are uninsured, said Gould.
She said it won't be until 2014, when Obama's Affordable Care Act
fully kicks in, that more people will be able to find affordable
health care coverage.
What health care reform is (and isn't) doing now
Kathleen Sebelius, the Secretary of Health and Human Services,
said the report is evidence that the Obama administration's health
care reform is already starting to work.
Citing a provision that went into effect last year that allows
parents to keep their children on their health insurance policy
until they are 26 years old, Sebelius noted that the percentage of
young adults ages 18 to 24 who were insured increased to 72.8% in
2010 from 70.7% in 2009.
"We expect even more will gain coverage in 2011 when the policy is
fully phased in," wrote Sebelius on HealthCare.gov, a web site run
by the federal government.
Among the states, Texas had the highest percentage of uninsured;
at 24.6%. Still, it was an improvement from the 26.1% who were
uninsured in 2009. New Mexico had the second highest rate of
uninsured people with 21.6%. Nevada was third at 21.3% and
Mississippi's rate jumped to 21.1% from 17.3% in 2009.
Despite being home to a high percentage of retirees, many of whom
are covered by Medicare, Florida had an uninsured rate of 20.8%
down from 21.7% in 2009.
In Massachusetts, where former governor Mitt Romney instituted his
controversial state-wide health insurance plan in 2006, only 5.6%
of the population lacks coverage, the lowest rate of uninsured of
any state.
Other states that boasted a smaller percentage of uninsured
included Hawaii (7.7%), Wisconsin and Maine (both 9.4%) and
Vermont (9.5%). To top of page