May 1, 2018

The Uninsured Rate Is Going Up

The Commonwealth Fund reports that the number of uninsured is inching back up:

Commonwealth’s data shows that the uninsured rate is up nearly three points since 2016, which represents about 4 million people. This surprised me, so I checked the other usual sources for information about the uninsured. Here’s Gallup:

Gallup hasn’t released its latest numbers yet, but they show an increase since 2016 of about one percentage point through the end of 2017. My usual preferred source for estimates of the uninsured is the quarterly CDC survey, but they lag considerably behind other pollsters. Here’s their latest:

If you squint, they show an increase of about half a percentage point since 2016, but that’s from autumn of last year—and it’s going to be a while before we get more recent data from the CDC.

Putting this all together, my guess is that the uninsured rate has gone up since 2016, but probably not by as much as Commonwealth says. If I had to, I’d put my money on an increase of one percentage point or so, which represents about 2 million people.

That’s still a lot of people. They’re the ones paying the price for Donald Trump’s furious effort to sabotage everything Obama-related.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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