Alaskan small businesses are hurting after ACA tax credits lapse

For Mark Robokoff, his pet store, AK Bark in Anchorage, is an ode to community. 

The shop offers goods from 35 local suppliers who provide everything from cat and dog treats to leashes and collars, and it’s filled with items meant to get pets through the state’s long, cold and dark winters. It’s a place, he explained, for Alaskans — a shop filled with snow suits, warm booties and bright LED lights. 

“I’m really proud of my little store,” Robokoff said. “I really created something nice here. I wagered my life savings to do it, and worked for a year without getting paid. I didn’t pay myself for over a year.” 

A decade later, Robokoff had been doing so well that he thought he’d be able to open a second store outside of Anchorage. Instead, he’s using the money he thought would be for a second shop to pay his soaring healthcare costs. 

Last year, Robokoff was paying $953 a month for health insurance for him and his wife. This year, that rose to $2,856. 

The increase happened after congressional Republicans last year did not extend enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits that had helped tens of millions of Americans purchase health insurance through their state marketplaces. Insurance premiums skyrocketed, and more than 3,000 Alaskans had dropped their marketplace coverage at the beginning of the year. Close to 7,000 more are expected to lose their ACA insurance plans, according to an analysis by Democratic members of the congressional Joint Economic Committee.

Congressional Republicans, who have for years worked to overturn the Affordable Care Act, argued that the ACA subsidies, created in 2021 under the American Rescue Plan Act in response to COVID, were always meant to expire and that lawmakers should address healthcare costs without the tax credits. Democratic lawmakers said the subsidies were needed so people didn’t lose their health insurance while Congress debated making healthcare more affordable.

In 2024, 16.5% of Alaska residents purchased health insurance through Affordable Care Act marketplaces, according to an analysis of federal data from the health policy organization KFF. The Alaska Beacon found in 2025 that of the 28,736 Alaskans with marketplace insurance, 25,170 had received the enhanced premium tax credits.

Amber Lee, the director of Protect Our Care Alaska, which advocates for affordable health insurance, said the end of those credits is especially damaging in Alaska, which has some of the highest healthcare costs in the country and where getting medical care can be particularly difficult because many communities aren’t accessible by road.

State transportation officials reported in 2025 that 82% of Alaska communities aren’t reachable by road.

“A lot of Alaskans aren’t on the road system; getting to healthcare is difficult, and so anything that you do to upset the fragile balance that we have here, any time you make it harder, it threatens that system even more,” Lee said. “The premium tax credits really helped Alaskans with being able to afford insurance on the marketplace, and it was especially helpful for people who are small-business owners or entrepreneurs, which Alaska is always trying to encourage here to diversify our economy.”

Lee, who owns her own consulting business, has seen the cost of her insurance for herself and her two sons rise from about $175 a month last year to $900 this year. She noted that it’s especially important that she have insurance because her son has autism and she has a genetic condition called hereditary leiomyoma and renal cell cancer syndrome, which can cause kidney cancer, skin lesions and other health problems. 

Even with insurance, Lee said, she still has significant healthcare costs, including a medication that costs her $500 a month. Last year, Lee had $55,000 in medical costs that insurance didn’t cover, including a $20,000 dental procedure for her son. That, she emphasized, was before the increase in her premium. Now, she expects those costs will rise further. 

“Because of the kind of work I do — I’m a consultant — that just means I have to take on more work, which means less time with my kids, less time being able to do anything but work,” Lee said.

The tax credits had been especially helpful for small-business owners and employees who didn’t receive health insurance through their work, Robokoff said. The end of the tax credits hurts small-business owners financially because of rising premium costs or an inability to afford insurance altogether, while large corporations see no change in their finances, he said.

“As far as I’m concerned, this is a tax increase that is targeted to small businesses,” Robokoff said. “Because the subsidies leveled the playing field such that small businesses were more able to compete with huge corporations that have negotiated sweet healthcare deals for their employees. The subsidies essentially leveled the playing field so that small businesses could afford their own health insurance.” 

“I consider it a slap in the face to small businesses who are constantly being called the backbone of our community, the lifeblood of our economy,” he continued. “America runs on small businesses, but this tax increase — as I’m going to continue to call it, because that’s what it is for me — targets that lifeblood backbone.”

State Rep. Genevieve Mina, who pushed for Congress to extend the ACA tax credits, said the subsidies provided critical support for small-business owners who help to grow the state’s economy. 

“Our state budget, and our economy, has been pretty heavily dependent on the oil and gas industry, and there’s a lot of conversation of how we do diversify our economy,” said Mina, whose district includes the Airport Heights, Mountain View and Russian Jack neighborhoods in Anchorage. “In order to do that, we need people to start small businesses. We need people to be entrepreneurs. People can’t make that jump fully if they don’t also have that flexibility of having health coverage when they make that jump.”

For Robokoff, the lapse of the subsidies means he’s no longer expanding his business as he had planned. 

“We happened to have a very good year last year,” he said. “It was a cold winter, so a lot of people needed coats and booties. So we had a good year last year. It was, hey, we’re ahead of the game. Things are looking good. It might be time to finally start looking at building that second store in Wasilla, or some other options. And nope, the extra money just was gone.”

The mounting healthcare costs come as other prices are rising for small businesses, said Alan Harris, the owner of Allstar Moving in Anchorage. The loss of the ACA tax credits means Harris will likely end up paying between $4,000 and $6,000 more for health insurance this year — and that coincides with gas prices increasing amid the war in Iran.

Harris is spending about $20 more a day on fuel than he was before the war, which he explained is money he could have used to buy his crew lunch. Ultimately, the longer these increased prices continue, the more likely it will be that businesses like his will have to raise their prices for customers, he said.

“What I would like to see is the government not attack foreign countries that we’re not at war at, causing the price of oil to go through the roof,” Harris said. “There are plenty of things to be at war with, like cancer, Alzheimer’s, poverty, and ignorance. Attacking some people in Iran for no particular reason doesn’t do any of us any good.” 

Robokoff and Harris both say they hope their government, whether that’s the current Congress or the new Congress following November’s midterm elections, can hear small-business owners’ pleas for help. Both business owners said they support a single-payer healthcare system to provide affordable healthcare for everyone in the country. 

At the very least, Robokoff said, a return of the ACA tax credits would be welcomed. That, he explained, would allow him to open the second store he’s been dreaming about. 

“It’s on semi-permanent hold right now,” he said. “It could wake back up in a second if the subsidies were to come back.”