Los Angeles County arguably has more to lose than any other California county if the Affordable Care Act is repealed or dramatically scaled back.
With more than 10 million residents, it is the state’s most populous county by far ― a distinction reflected in the number of Angelenos who obtained health coverage under Obamacare.
One thing that’s changed is that we’ve learned some things from the ACA. We’ve learned that when you get coverage, it actually improves health status.
Second, now we not only have Covered California, but it is widely considered to be the most successful exchange in the country. If you closed down Covered California, you would lose all the money you put in there.
Covered California does not need the ACA in order to exist. The issue is that 85 percent of the people getting coverage on Covered California are getting a subsidy. If you shrink the subsidy sufficiently, people will not be able to afford it. But you actually now have the infrastructure to provide people coverage.
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