Census: Health coverage expands in 2014

WASHINGTON – The share of Americans without health insurance fell to 10.4 percent in 2014 as nearly 9 million people gained health coverage, according to government figures released Wednesday.

Thirty-three million Americans lacked health insurance in 2014, down from 41.8 million, or 13.3 percent, in 2013, the annual Census Bureau survey found.

The findings largely reflect the coverage expansions engineered by the Affordable Care Act, President Barack Obama’s signature legislative achievement, which requires most Americans to have health insurance or pay a fine.

The Affordable Care Act introduced insurance marketplaces that sell health plans to people who lack job-based coverage and expanded eligibility for Medicaid, the state/national health plan for low-income Americans. The new Census Bureau report is the first to measure health insurance coverage after these two policy changes were fully implemented.

The largest change in coverage last year was a 3.2 percentage point gain in “direct-purchase” coverage, which includes health plans sold through state and the federal marketplaces. Medicaid coverage also grew by 2 percentage points last year and is now covering 19.5 percent of Americans.