More than 261,000 People in Iowa Will Be Eligible for Health Care Premium Tax Credits in 2014

As Part of the Huge and Unprecedented Middle-Income Tax Cut, Iowans’ Taxes Will Be Reduced by $974 Million in 2014

Washington, D.C.—Beginning in 2014, approximately 261,200 people in Iowa will be eligible for new tax cuts that will significantly reduce the cost of private health insurance for those individuals and families. The historic tax cut in the health reform law, which is estimated to reduce nationwide income taxes by more than $110 billion in 2014 alone, will be provided through tax credits to offset a portion of the cost of health insurance premiums, and Iowans’ tax reductions will be $974 million in that year.

Those are among the key findings of a report for Iowa released today by the health care consumer group Families USA, which commissioned The Lewin Group to use its economic models to estimate how many individuals in the state would benefit from the new premium tax credits.

Titled “Lower Taxes, Lower Premiums: The New Health Insurance Tax Credit in Iowa,” the report also states that the vast majority of Iowans who will be eligible for the premiums tax credit—97 percent—will be in working families.

• Approximately 232,700 people, the majority of those who will be eligible for the credits, will be in families with a worker who is employed full-time.
• Another 21,700 people will be in families with a worker who is employed part-time.

The new tax credit targets middle-income families. For families of four, the tax credits—provided on a sliding scale—are focused on families with annual incomes between $29,327 and $88,200.

• People with annual incomes at or above 200 percent of the federal poverty level, $44,100 for a family of four in 2010, will constitute more than two-thirds (68 percent) of the people who will be eligible for a premium tax credit.
• Because the size of the tax credit is determined on a sliding scale based on income, however, more than half of the dollars from the tax cut (54 percent) will be targeted to families with incomes below 200 percent of poverty.

“This is the largest middle-income tax cut in history, and it will enable many hard-working Iowans to afford health insurance premiums that have stretched family budgets,” said Ron Pollack, Executive Director of Families USA.

“The tax cut will not only put significant extra cash in Iowans’ pocketbooks, but it will also ease the burden of families’ growing health care costs,” Pollack said.

There are about 105,000 uninsured Iowans who will be eligible for the tax credits, and another 156,100 eligible people are currently insured but are still struggling to afford coverage.

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Families USA is the national organization for health care consumers. It is nonprofit and nonpartisan and advocates for high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans.

1201 New York Avenue NW, Suite 1100 · Washington, DC 20005
202-628-3030 · Email: info@familiesusa.org · www.familiesusa.org