New Jersey: Here's the ~739,000 residents who could lose coverage, by county

Assuming 310,000 people enroll in private exchange policies by the end of January, I estimate around 207,000 of them would be forced off of their private policy upon an immediate-effect full ACA repeal, plus another 532,000 enrolled in the ACA Medicaid expansion program, for a total of 739,000 New Jersey residents kicked to the curb.

Thanks to Louise Norris for providing this report which breaks out the Medicaid expansion numbers by county. It's worth noting that like New York, New Jersey will also see more people lose Medicaid coverage post-ACA repeal than technically signed up "because" of the law because they, too, had previously partly expanded Medicaid via a pre-ACA waiver which has since expired. Unlike New York, however, in New Jersey's case I had already baked the larger number into my estimates anyway, so it hasn't changed anything.

As for the individual market, my standard methodology applies:

  • Plug in the 2/01/16 QHP selections by county (hard numbers via CMS)
  • Project QHP selections as of 1/31/17 based on statewide signup estimates. In Louisiana, I actually expect the number of exchange QHPs to drop by about 17% from last year, mainly due to cannibalization by the Medicaid expansion program of those in the 100-138% FPL income range.
  • Knock 10% off those numbers to account for those who never end up paying their premiums
  • Multiply the projected effectuated enrollees as of March by the percent expected to receive APTC subsidies
  • Then knock another 10% off of that number to account for those only receiving nominal subsidies
  • Whatever's left after that are the number of people in each county who wouldn't be able to afford their policy without tax credits.

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