Payback time is here: Health-Law Patients Boost Hospital Profits

From The Wall Street Journal:

A wave of newly insured patients helped boost hospitals' earnings in recent months, two hospital operators said Friday, a sign the law's coverage expansion is leading more patients to seek treatment.

Under the law, up to 26 million people are expected to gain coverage over the next few years through expanded state-run Medicaid programs and through the new, online marketplaces that allow consumers to get subsidies to buy coverage. Many who were previously uninsured already received hospital care, but sometimes racked up bills that were never paid.

The hospital industry supported the 2010 law—which was expected to cost hospitals $155 billion in penalties and government pay cuts over a decade—on the promise that it would deliver a wave of new, paying patients. But hitches as the law rolled out, including a Supreme Court decision that allowed states to opt out of the Medicaid expansion and a troubled launch of the marketplace websites, threw doubt on whether those gains would materialize.