When the health insurance exchanges began operating last year, critics complained that people were being forced out of their insurance plans. They correctly pointed out that Obama was mistaken to promise that “if you like your healthcare plan, you will be able to keep your plan.” Obama’s promise was wrong not because the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) ripped irreplaceable insurance plans from people. He was wrong because he failed to recognize that the way the insurance industry works in the U.S., people regularly lose their plans.
A study in Health Affairs by Benjamin Sommers (from the Harvard School of Public Health) explored what happened to a nationally representative population of non-elderly people who – ahem, prior to the ACA – purchased insurance without the help of an employer or union. His analysis shows tremendous turnover in health insurance coverage. (Please visit Forbes to read the full article and view comments.)
