The state has hired former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder as outside counsel to overcome this challenge.
As the Republican party launches its efforts to deconstruct the Affordable Care Act (ACA), a recent study suggests massive damage to California insurance jobs. In fact, the research indicated that the state could see losses of over 200,000 insurance and health care positions from an ACA repeal.
Repealing the federal health care reform could also slash an annual $20.5 billion from the California economy.
These forecasts were produced by the UC Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education. They stated that up to 209,000 California insurance jobs and health care positions and $20.5 billion would disappear from the state’s economy.
The lost economic revenue would be the outcome of losing about $5 billion in federal subsidies. Those subsidies assisted state residents who purchase health plans through the Covered California exchange. Also contributing to that loss would be the elimination of the over $15 billion funding for the state’s Medicaid expansion, said the Berkeley study.
The California insurance jobs and health care positions would disappear as individual coverage falls.
According to study co-author, Laurel Lucia, a UC Berkeley healthcare program manager, the insurance job losses were calculated based on the launch of the ACA. “Hospitals, clinics, and other providers staffed up to meet increased demand as a result of the ACA and our economic modeling software estimates that many of those jobs would be lost if the ACA is repealed,” said Lucia.
The report pointed to many different areas where jobs would be lost, including insurance, as well as many throughout the healthcare arena such as nursing homes, physician’s offices, hospitals, outpatient centers, ambulatory care centers, labs, dentist offices and more. Moreover, it also underscored that other industries would also suffer job losses due to the ripple effect within the Californian economy.
The California insurance jobs and additional healthcare workers have had a positive impact on the state’s economy which could be lost from the ACA repeal. “Our analysis takes into account the multiplier effect,” explained Lucia. “When healthcare workers found new jobs, their income was circulated through the community multiple times,” she said.