Jonathan Gruber, the MIT economist and Obama health-reform adviser, has been featured on these pages for, among other things, boldly predicting in 2010 that Obamacare would “for sure” reduce insurance premiums, while subsequently telling state governments that Obamacare would increasepremiums by as much as 30 percent. Apparently, however, that analytical foul-up has left Prof. Gruber unbowed. This week, he’s releasing a new report “describing the vast differences in the impact on people in every state between ObamaCare” and Mitt Romney’s plan for national health reform. Given that his predictions keep changing from year to year, how reliable will his analysis be?
Politico Pro reported yesterday that Gruber is hosting a news conference, slated for Thursday, to discuss his new paper. “The report provides new national data comparing the small differences between ObamaCare and RomneyCare [in Massachusetts], and provides new national and state-by-state data describing the vast differences in the impact on people in every state between ObamaCare and RomneyCandidateCare [Romney’s plan for national reform].” Gruber will be joined at the news conference by Stuart Altman, a health economist at Brandeis.