White House: 11.4 million Uninsured-Americans now covered by ♡bamaCare!!!.
Avik Roy: Not so fast.
Could the real number not be quite what President Obama claims? Would you believe… less than half what the President claims? Of course you would. Roy explains:
We don’t know the actual number of Obamacare exchange enrollees who were previously uninsured, because the Obama administration hasn’t tracked those statistics. But we do know that at least 4.7 million Americans received cancellation notices in 2013, because Obamacare’s regulations made their health plans illegal. Based on survey data from McKinsey, last May I estimated that 2.6 million previously uninsured individuals gained private non-group coverage. A survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 57% of those with exchange-based coverage were previously uninsured, which would amount to 3.8 million in 2014.
We also can’t predict whether or not the uninsured fraction will be higher in 2015 than it was in 2014. But if we carry forward the more generous Kaiser estimate of 57%, and combine it with the 84% retention rate, we can estimate that about 5.4 million previously uninsured individuals would be enrolled in Obamacare’s exchanges by the end of the 2015 enrollment period, based on current figures.
Needless to say, 5.4 million is not as impressive as 11.4 million.
Every Administration fudges the numbers. This Administration uses double fudge, slathered in Nutella and coated in a hard candy shell with sprinkles on top. This confectionary monstrosity is then served with a side lecture about the importance of nutrition.
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