Maggie's Farm

The New York Times makes much of a MIT professor disputing the PriceWaterhouseCooper analysis saying that ObamaCare would escalate the cost of private insurance policies.  This same MIT professor in 2007 published the result of his study of 10-years experience with "crowd out," the shift from private insurance to government programs when government programs are expanded.

In Prof. Gruber’s own words after studying the effect of government insurance programs, “Our central estimates suggest that crowd-out is on the order of 60%: private insurance coverage is reduced by 60% as much as public insurance coverage rises when there are public eligibility expansions.”

Prof. Gruber is touted as an advisor to devising the Massachusetts experiment that has resulted in higher costs than promised, less access, and now moves toward rationing top-class care, the state's private insurance policy premiums being among the highest in the US. 

Professor, are you willing to swap your MIT health plan to join the plebes?