Unaffordability index: Rent, GLP-1s, Obamacare

0:01NPR.

0:06This is The Indicator from Planet Money. I'm Waylon Wong. And I'm Adrian Ma. I'm Ricky Mulvey. And you guys, fall is officially here and so is Indicators of the Week. Are you guys switching to warm beverages? Oh, no. Bonfires? Scarves? Black coffee and beef jerky. It's the same all year round. The Ricky Mulvey diet. I pulled out a sweatshirt out of the closet for the first time. And it was, I was like, I need to wash this thing first. But then it was very cozy. Nice. Well, we like to be cozy here in Indicators of the Week. Although, I guess, that's a bad segue because none of these are very cozy.

0:50Cozy vibes for uncozy economic data. Each new season brings a round of fresh headlines. And we are here to make sense of the week's top economic news. So on today's show, we have a growing portion of U.S. adults having trouble paying their rent. The Trump administration is booting a lot of people off Obamacare. And your employer might be dropping GLP-1. That's after the break.

1:18This message comes from KeyBank. Growing a successful business has never been easy. But whether you're navigating a complex industry or trying to reinvent one, KeyBank's breadth of banking experts are here to collaborate on market-proven solutions. At KeyBank, they're built to grow with your changing needs. Because they're not just there for the business you are now, they're there for the business you'll become. Reimagine business as usual. KeyBank opens doors. Learn more at key.com slash b2b. This message comes from Dell Technologies. Interruptions happen at work. But with the Dell Pro laptop powered by Intel Core Ultra with vPro, built with optimized battery and built-in intelligence, your tech won't slow you down.

2:03Dell.com slash Dell-Pro. Built for you. This message comes from Amazon Business. Free your team from time-consuming procurement tasks. Discover smart business buying, where unmatched selection meets AI-driven tools to simplify complex processes. Learn more at AmazonBusiness.com. Okay, Waylon Wong, start us off. My indicator is 21.6%. That is the percentage of middle-income renters who said they had problems paying rent at some point in 2025. This number comes from the Urban Institute. They're a think tank that does research on upward mobility and social policy. And this number, 21.6%, is significantly up from the year before.

2:49Yikes. And you said these are middle-income renters. So how do they even define that? Yeah, so middle-income means someone who makes three to five times the federal poverty level. So that's around$31 ,000 to$63 ,000 for a single adult. Or if you're looking at a family of three, around$53 ,000 to$107 ,000 a year. Okay, so even people in this salary range are having trouble paying for housing. Yeah, they told the Urban Institute in a survey that they either couldn't make their full rent payment or were late on payment because they couldn't afford it. Yeah, and if people have missed rent, then they're probably having trouble with other bills and expenses too.

3:26Yeah, the Urban Institute makes this point about the kind of interconnectedness of all these expenses and how difficult it is for a lot of households now. And they also asked people about their utility bills in this survey. And for 2025, almost 21 % of these middle-income renters said that they couldn't pay their full gas, electric or oil bill at some point during the year. Well, I mean, you've got all those expenses and then you've got groceries and gas and health care. It's enough to make a person spiral with existential dread. Yes. And speaking of spiraling, I've got an indicator that touches on this.

4:06OK, what is it? 760 ,000. That is the number of individuals whose Obamacare slash Affordable Care Act health insurance has been canceled because their enrollment was allegedly fraudulent or improper. I don't have any serious analysis. Just yikes. What's going on? So Vice President J.D. Vance announced the move this week, along with Dr. Mehmet Oz, who oversees the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. And the agency gave a few reasons for this purge. For one thing, they say people who are being cut are ineligible for ACA subsidies because their income is too high or because they already have access to employer-provided health care.

4:48They also said they've cut people because they lacked certain information on their applications, like social security numbers, or because someone signed them up without their knowledge. How did they figure out who had maybe violated some of these things? Well, the government says it worked with health insurance companies to identify improper enrollees, but there are still questions about exactly how did they make these determinations. And some advocates are worried that this culling will actually affect people who were legitimately qualified. Yeah. And this is happening at a time when a lot of people have to drop their ACA plans because they've gotten too expensive.

5:28Right. And experts predicted this would happen because Congress failed to approve additional subsidies last year. And even though 23 million people initially signed up for ACA plans last year, only about 19 million are enrolled now. Okay, so that's a big drop. And then they're calling another 700 ,000 plus people from these plans? That's right. And this shrinking of the Obamacare pool, as we've discussed in a previous episode, it's not good for the ACA marketplace. This is like any type of insurance, right? You need a large pool of people for it to remain financially solvent. And for the ACA, if enough people keep leaving, that could lead to what experts call a death spiral.

6:13Uh-oh. On that note, we actually have a call out for listeners. Help us report out what's going on here. If you have dropped your ACA coverage because it was too expensive or the government recently canceled your insurance because they say it was fraudulent, let us know. Email indicator at npr.org. Okay. Thanks, Adrian. Ian and Ricky, what do you have? Another spiral? Another spiral. My indicator is 11%. This is the number of large employers who dropped GLP-1 coverage from their health plans last year, or they're strongly considering it for next year. And we're talking Ozempic, Zepbound, etc. This is according to Mercer, which is a benefits consulting firm.

6:53And these drugs, yes, they are a huge cost for employers. Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan told CNBC that the company spends about$250 million a year on GLP-1s. That's up from zero a few years ago, and that translates to more than 10 % of the company's entire healthcare budget. But Moynihan called it a good investment. Huh. Does it have something to do with, like, health conditions tied to people's weight? Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of conditions that are expensive to cover, heart disease, diabetes, to even some cancers. But these drugs in and of themselves are very expensive. Companies like Cigna and PepsiCo are pulling back on coverage.

7:33We did an episode recently on this, and it was about kind of some of the hard choices that employers face. Because on one hand, if you think about it as a long-term investment, then you're like, OK, this is a good thing for us to be putting in money in because it'll make our employees healthier over the long term. But in the nearer term, it is incredibly expensive and health care costs are going up generally. So some companies are having a really tough time affording it. Yeah, these health costs are a real pressure point for companies. The average health benefit cost per employee is about$18 ,500 this year.

8:05It's almost a 7 % yearly increase and well above headline inflation. We had billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban on The Indicator recently talking about healthcare, and he just posted, I hope people realize that for the foreseeable future, the cost of healthcare benefits will get more people fired or not hired than artificial intelligence. That's a hot take. We'll need some economists to kind of do a big kind of like retroactive study in a few years to see if this thesis is true. I think it's like an Occam's razor thing, right? Like there's this cloud of artificial intelligence and how it may or may not impact companies and your job future.

8:42But right now, health care costs are currently getting more expensive and companies are seeing that and wondering if they can hire more people. Reasonable hypothesis, but. I think you might have a point there. We're at step what? One, two, or three? We're going to put a pin in it. Yeah. We're going to put a pin in it. Okay. We'll do the rest of the scientific method later. Economists and companies, they're facing another question, which is, what do you do about GLP-1s? Yes, they're incredibly expensive. Yes, they can reduce the risk of major health events, but do they actually save money? So please dim your internal light that recognizes the divine humanity in others and put on your maximized shareholder value hat.

9:22Do you have one of these hats or do you only wear it ironically or what? I wear it only at board meetings. But I know you have one. With your monocle and your three-piece suit? Of course. A working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research, they found actually that GLP-1s do not reduce health spending over a five-year period. I mean, we could see different results in 10 or 20 years. True. And also in the coming years, generics are going to enter the market, which could bring down costs substantially. A morsel of hope. I will take it. This episode was produced by Angel Carreras and engineered by Jimmy Keely.

10:01It's fact-checked by Julia Ritchie. Kate Kincannon is our editor, and The Indicator is a production of NPR.

10:14This message comes from HomeServe. A burst pipe. A dead water heater. The AC calling it quits. Who do you call? HomeServe is an easy way to handle unexpected home repairs. With plans covering stuff basic homeowners insurance usually won't. Instead of scrambling for a contractor, you make one call to get the repair process started. Join the millions of customers who trust HomeServe right now. Go to homeserve.com slash podcast for 50 % less your first year. Savings compared to renewal price, void in Florida. This message comes from Mint Mobile. If you're tired of spending hundreds on big wireless bills, bogus fees, and free perks, Mint Mobile is for you.

10:55Shop plans at mintmobile.com slash switch. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details.