Timely Analyses of Possible Changes to the Affordable Care Act

The project team will use the RAND COMPARE Microsimulation Model to analyze the likely impact of policy changes and alternatives under discussion. RAND’s widely respected model has been used by the Commonwealth Fund, the U.S. Departments of Labor and Health and Human Services, and others, to project the impact of major U.S. policy changes, including the Affordable Care Act. Outside of the Congressional Budget Office’s microsimulation model, RAND COMPARE is one of only 2 to 3 microsimulation models currently available to model the effects of health reform. COMPARE is current with the latest federal data and is therefore ready to perform timely analyses. This modeling effort will inform policymakers, the media, and the public about the coverage and budgetary impacts of alternative health care proposals and policy changes to the ACA. This analysis will be important to the health care policy debate underway in the 2016 election, and provide a quantitative look at what changes to the current health care law would mean for consumers and the federal budget.