Why might you be asking? Because of the Affordable Care Act. With the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the health insurance market has raised by 64%, resulting in nearly 2.2 million Californians buying individual health insurance within the last year.

As of December 31st, 2014, 843,607 California residents joined the individual health insurance market both inside and outside of the Covered California insurance exchange. California along with Florida, Texas and Georgia alone count for about half of nationwide growth for individual  health insurance policies.

Nationally, by December 2014, 15.5 million people had purchased their own individual health insurance policy by year’s end, a raise of 46% from December 2013. A large part of this pattern of growth can be attributed to The Affordable Care Act. When implemented, “it triggered a major overhaul of the health insurance market by guaranteeing people coverage regardless of their medical conditions and providing financial subsidies to lower-income consumers.” In addition to this, American healthcare law requires that most people purchase a health insurance policy, and if they fail to do so, pay a tax penalty.

Another interesting statistic is that nearly half of Californians continue to get their health benefits through their employer, despite a declining in the number of companies offering coverage to workers. In 2014 58% of California employees were offered  health insurance coverage, while 69% had been given this option in 2010. Note that these figures don’t include the entire 2014/15 open enrollment period.

During the time between February 15 and October 31st 2015  the Special Enrollment period allows Californians to apply for health insurance when certain life events are taken place. Life events such as moving , birth or adopting of a child, death in the family, divorce or losing job-based insurance are circumstances  which allow you to apply for health insurance outside the Open Enrollment Period. Note that the state’s Medi-Cal program is open year-round.

Need help figuring out which affordable health insurance in California is best for you and for your budget? Get in touch with Solid Health Insurance today.