Winners From Obamacare Mounting

The attacks on Obamacare may come back in the 2014 election but they will resonate less and less because of stories like this one:

Sue Spanke of Missoula, Mont., was highly displeased this fall when she learned her health insurance had been canceled.

“I got so mad that I went to my phone and started calling all the political people and giving them what for,” Spanke told The Billings Gazette. That was before she learned she was eligible for a policy at a much lower cost.

After angrily calling her state auditor’s office, Spanke, a self-employed artist in her 50s, found she was eligible for a federal subsidy. Her new insurance will cover her for a mere $30 to $40 a month with a deductible of only $500. She had been paying $350 a month for a Blue Cross policy with a $5,000 deductible. “I went from a horrible policy that didn’t cover anything, that was breaking me, to the best policy at the best price I’ve had since I was in my 20s,” she said.

The political dynamics surrounding Obamacare are only going to get better for its supporters.

No doubt there will be some Obamacare losers—most of them healthy, wealthy people who will have to pay a bit more. And there will be plenty of libertarian critics who will denounce the perceived paternalism of the situation. But there is no shortage of winners.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.