How Health Insurance Coverage in Georgia Compares to Other States

The share of Americans under the age of 65 without health insurance fell every year between 2010, when the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, and 2016, when President Barack Obama left office. Though the U.S. uninsured rate among Americans younger than 65 has inched up over the years since, it remains well below the reported 17%+ figures in the years leading up to the ACA.

Without a universal health care program, most Americans under age 65 — the age of eligibility for Medicare — receive employer-based health insurance coverage. Under this system, 10.8% of Americans younger than 65, approximately 29 million people, lacked health insurance in 2019 — and that was before the COVID-19 pandemic put over 22 million Americans out of work.

While most of those jobs have since been restored, the official uninsured rate for Americans younger than 65 for 2020 will likely be higher than the 2019 rate.

In Georgia, an estimated 1,383,392 residents lack health insurance coverage — or 15.5% of the under 65 noninstitutionalized population, the fourth highest uninsured rate among states.

Across the state, 58.1% of the population under age 65 have employer-based insurance, compared to 60.0% of the same age group nationwide. Another 17.5% of the under 65 population in the state are insured through Medicaid, and 9.2% purchased their own insurance directly — compared to the national rates of 21.0% and 9.7%, respectively.

The rankings in this story are based on one-year estimates of the percentage of Americans under 65 without health insurance from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2019 American Community Survey.

Rank	State	Pop. under 65 w/o insurance	Pop. under 65 with employer-based insurance	Pop. under 65 with directly purchased insurance	Pop. under 65 with Medicaid
50	Massachusetts	3.5%	68.1%	10.2%	23.0%
49	Rhode Island	4.8%	66.8%	11.7%	21.6%
48	Hawaii	5.0%	66.9%	9.9%	19.5%
47	Vermont	5.6%	60.6%	10.3%	25.8%
46	Minnesota	5.8%	69.8%	8.4%	18.9%
45	Iowa	6.0%	67.6%	8.5%	21.3%
44	New York	6.1%	60.2%	10.8%	26.9%
43	Wisconsin	6.8%	69.5%	8.8%	17.6%
41 — tied	Maryland	6.9%	65.6%	9.3%	19.6%
41 — tied	Michigan	6.9%	63.7%	8.9%	23.8%
39 — tied	Pennsylvania	7.0%	65.1%	9.2%	22.0%
39 — tied	Connecticut	7.0%	64.2%	8.5%	23.2%
38	New Hampshire	7.6%	68.8%	9.1%	14.6%
36 — tied	Kentucky	7.7%	57.1%	7.3%	28.3%
36 — tied	Washington	7.7%	63.7%	8.3%	21.4%
35	Ohio	7.8%	64.4%	7.3%	22.2%
33 — tied	North Dakota	8.1%	68.3%	13.6%	12.4%
33 — tied	Delaware	8.1%	63.6%	8.3%	23.0%
32	West Virginia	8.3%	57.4%	5.7%	30.0%
30 — tied	Oregon	8.6%	61.4%	9.4%	23.0%
30 — tied	Illinois	8.6%	64.9%	8.3%	19.7%
29	California	8.9%	56.9%	10.4%	26.4%
28	New Jersey	9.2%	66.4%	8.7%	17.4%
26 — tied	Virginia	9.3%	64.4%	9.3%	14.5%
26 — tied	Colorado	9.3%	62.4%	10.5%	18.1%
25	Nebraska	9.8%	67.2%	12.1%	13.4%
24	Maine	10.1%	61.4%	10.5%	20.2%
23	Montana	10.2%	55.0%	13.6%	23.6%
22	Indiana	10.3%	64.4%	7.8%	19.1%
21	Louisiana	10.5%	50.9%	8.4%	31.6%
20	Utah	10.8%	68.8%	12.5%	9.8%
18 — tied	Kansas	10.9%	66.4%	10.1%	14.3%
18 — tied	Arkansas	10.9%	51.4%	9.1%	29.1%
17	Alabama	11.7%	58.2%	9.7%	20.8%
15 — tied	New Mexico	12.0%	46.1%	7.6%	37.0%
15 — tied	Missouri	12.0%	63.3%	9.3%	15.6%
14	Tennessee	12.1%	58.4%	9.6%	21.0%
13	South Dakota	12.2%	61.8%	12.8%	14.2%
12	Idaho	12.8%	58.7%	12.9%	17.3%
11	South Carolina	13.2%	57.0%	10.1%	20.2%
9 — tied	North Carolina	13.4%	56.7%	10.7%	19.2%
9 — tied	Nevada	13.4%	59.4%	8.7%	18.9%
8	Arizona	13.6%	56.2%	8.5%	22.8%
7	Alaska	13.9%	55.0%	6.4%	22.8%
6	Wyoming	14.8%	62.6%	10.8%	12.3%
5	Mississippi	15.4%	50.9%	8.6%	25.1%
4	Georgia	15.5%	58.1%	9.2%	17.5%
3	Florida	16.3%	51.4%	14.2%	18.1%
2	Oklahoma	16.8%	54.8%	9.3%	18.7%
1	Texas	20.8%	54.8%	8.6%	16.2%