North Dakota Farmers Brace For Loss of ACA Subsidies

(Adobe Stock via Prairie News Service)

(By Mike Moen. Prairie News Service) – Roughly 70 percent of North Dakota’s agriculture workforce makes use of enhanced federal subsidies for health premiums on the Affordable Care Act marketplace. But with an expiration date looming, they’re getting guidance on how to proceed without them.

The larger subsidies surfaced during the COVID-19 pandemic and are scheduled to go away at the end of December. Whether to extend them was a major factor in the recent government shutdown.

North Dakota-based Lance Boyer, sales director of financial products with Farmers Union Insurance, said farmers are among the many populations that saw cost relief with the extra aid. He said the predictions are worrisome with the clock ticking.

“We’re gonna see some folks go back to being uninsured,” said Boyer, “and we’re gonna see folks having to choose higher deductibles and higher out-of-pockets, to get those premiums down because they don’t have the tax credits to offset that.”