This study explores whether the Affordable Care Act’s Medicare Advantage (MA) payment cuts were associated with changes in MA enrollees’ access to and affordability of healthcare relative to traditional Medicare (TM) using data from the 2009, 2011, and 2017 National Health Interview Survey. Between 2009 and 2017, MA enrollees did not report statistically significant changes in access or affordability, and there were no statistically significant differences between changes in MA access and affordability relative to TM. Our findings show that MA plans reduced their costs under payment pressure without significantly affecting enrollees’ access to or affordability of care compared with TM.

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