Healthcare costs and rising insurance premiums have overtaken all other domestic concerns among Americans, according to a recent Gallup poll – a shift reflecting growing financial pressure on households nationwide.
The Gallup survey found that 61% of Americans say they worry a great deal about healthcare access and affordability, placing it first among 16 domestic policy areas. The issue now leads the economy by 10 percentage points - a gap that did not exist in 2025, when the two concerns were roughly tied.
Concern over healthcare costs cuts across political and generational lines. A Fox News poll found that 81% of voters described themselves as either “extremely” or “very” concerned about healthcare costs, trailing only inflation and high prices, which drew concern from 86% of voters.
Broken down by party, 89% of Democrats, 80% of Independents, and 72% of Republicans said they were either “extremely” or “very” concerned. By age, 77% of respondents under 45 and 83% of those over 45 expressed the same level of concern, a figure that reached 86% among those aged 65 and older.
A key driver of rising costs is the expiration of a pandemic-era enhanced subsidy under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress added an extra subsidy on top of the baseline premium tax credit available to lower- and middle-income households. The Trump administration and Congress allowed that enhanced subsidy to lapse at the end of 2025.
The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), a nonprofit focused on national healthcare policy, estimated that the expiration would cause annual out-of-pocket premium payments to jump 114% – from $888 in 2025 to $1,904 in 2026. Analysts have also linked premium increases in non-subsidized plans to broader healthcare cost growth.
The expiration of enhanced subsidies triggered a wave of policy debate in Washington – with no resolution. In December 2025, the Senate rejected two competing bills: a Democratic proposal to extend the credits for three years and a Republican alternative centered on health savings accounts, according to CBS News. As of early 2026, no extension had passed.
Data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) show that premium hikes have pushed consumers toward lower-cost options during the 2026 open enrollment period. The share of enrollees in bronze-tier plans – the least expensive – rose from 30% in 2025 to 40% in 2026, while silver-tier enrollment fell from 56% to 43%. Gold-tier enrollment edged up from 13% to 17%.
A separate report from CMS, released in March, revealed that the number of consumers who selected or re-enrolled in Marketplace coverage for 2026 stood at 23.1 million – a 5% decrease from 2025. Out-of-pocket monthly premiums also rose sharply, climbing from $113 in 2025 to $178 in 2026, an increase of $65 per month.
