The Benefit Aftereffects of ACA--Accelerating Toward a New Health Economy

While the Affordable Care Act (ACA) focused largely on improving access to health care coverage for the uninsured, its broader and longer-term influence may have been its impact on accelerating key trends and strategies that major employers and other stakeholders have been targeting for years. This article looks at some of these trends, where we were pre-ACA and how ACA (through benefit mandates, shared responsibility penalties, Cadillac plan tax, health information technology, accountable care organizations, etc.) has helped to accelerate and refocus efforts. In addition, the public exchange paradigm has given rise to a private exchange movement that is helping further accelerate the transformation of the New Health Economy.