Brief of California’s Projected Economic Losses under ACA Repeal

UC Berkeley Labor Center released a brief  that estimates the effects on employment, gross domestic product (GDP), and state and local tax revenue in California with the elimination of the major health insurance expansions, reduction in taxes, and removal of penalties under a partial repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

The summary estimates that an ACA repeal would not only take away health insurance from millions of Californians, but would also eliminate 209,000 jobs and $20.3 billion in GDP from the state economy.  Key findings include:

• The impact would be felt the most in counties with high Medi-Cal enrollment. Of the seven medium to large counties in which more than 10% of the population relies on the Medi-Cal expansion, six are already suffering from high unemployment.
• Each of these high-impact counties is estimated to lose thousands of jobs on net: Fresno (6,000), Kern (5,000), San Bernardino (12,000), San Joaquin (4,000), Stanislaus (3,000), and Tulare (3,000). Los Angeles County is expected to lose 63,000 jobs.
• ACA repeal would especially harm workers in the healthcare industry, which is estimated to lose 135,000 of the 209,000 eliminated jobs.