From WNYC Studios. I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Monday, December 15th.

Today is December 15th, the deadline for signing up for 2026 health insurance policies purchased on the Affordable Care Act exchanges if you want coverage to begin on the first of the year. You can wait until January 15th, but then your coverage won't begin until February. An estimated 22 million Americans get health insurance from the exchanges. As many of you know or are experiencing

yourself, premiums have been estimated to double compared to last year for a variety of reasons,

and Congress has not approved allowing the ACA subsidies to keep up with that. A bipartisan compromise,

we should say, is still possible, but has so far been out of reach,

and obviously here on December 15th, it's getting late. So we'll talk now about the different

visions for health care and health insurance economics that Democrats and Republicans have.

Also what you are facing now is a shopper for health insurance or for that matter as a

health care provider and the underlying causes of health care and health insurance getting more

expensive in the first place. Back with us for this is Julie Robner, Chief Washington correspondent

for KFF Health News and host of the weekly podcast called What the Health.

Some of you know she was an NPR health reporter before that.

Julie, we always appreciate your time.

Welcome back to WNYC.

Thanks for having me.

Julie, could you explain first in this case?

Because I'm not sure everybody understands it.

I'm not sure I understand it totally. It's confusing.

What exactly is today the deadline for and for whom? Well, you actually explained it pretty well.

If you buy your own insurance on one of the Affordable Care Act exchanges, today is the deadline to sign up for coverage that starts January 1st.

Open enrollment, as you say, continues until the middle of January. But anytime you sign up after

today, your insurance coverage won't start until February 1st. So it's always a month in advance.

...