What Happens When Affordable Healthcare Becomes Unaffordable?

Medical expenses are among the biggest contributors to Americans’ household debt and financial distress. With most other kinds of debt, you cannot go into debt unless and until you borrow money, and with many of them, the lenders do their due diligence to ensure that you will be able to repay the money before they lend it to you. You must jump through hoops to get approved for a credit card and clear higher hurdles still if you want an auto loan, high denomination unsecured personal loan, or home mortgage. By contrast, if you undergo medical treatment, the doctor’s office or hospital sends you a bill without regard to whether you can repay it. The biggest protection against this, of course, is health insurance, but the only people in the United States who have free health insurance are the ones in the worst financial circumstances. Economists call the difference between being able to afford health insurance and qualifying for Medicaid the “health insurance gap.” The Affordable Care Act, which created public option marketplace health insurance plans, closed the health insurance gap substantially, but marketplace insurance is another household expense, and in 2026, it threatens to get even more expense. If your family is on a tight budget with your current marketplace insurance and worried about how you will make ends meet with the increased premiums, contact a Philadelphia debt relief lawyer.

How Will the Healthcare Subsidy Cliff Affect Your Family’s Finances?

The cost of healthcare under the Affordable Care Act is one of the major issues about which lawmakers are at an impasse and is an obstacle to ending the government shutdown. Under the current policies, the premiums for some marketplace health insurance plans will be twice as expensive in 2026 as they are in 2025.

At first, the solution to this seems simple. Families can just opt for plans with lower premiums and higher out of pocket costs. Undoubtedly, some will do this, even if it means piles of medical debt for when they eventually need medical treatment. This is not the biggest problem, though. The biggest financial burden is that the government intends to discontinue a tax credit for marketplace healthcare policyholders; journalists call this the “subsidy cliff.” Without this tax credit, some consumers will not be able to afford any marketplace insurance plans and will fall into the health insurance gap. In anticipation of this, some have already decided not to buy health insurance in 2026, or else to buy it only for the youngest members of the family while the parents go without health insurance and just hope that they don’t get sick or injured.

Contact CONSUMERLAWPA.com About Coping With the Healthcare Unaffordability Crisis

A Philadelphia consumer law attorney can help you if you have health insurance through a marketplace plan and are worried about how the increase in premiums will affect your family’s finances.  Contact CONSUMERLAWPA.com to set up a free, confidential consultation.

Source:

cnbc.com/2025/11/08/aca-subsidy-cliff-government-shutdown.html