During his April 17th press conference, held to celebrate Obamacare's 8 million sign-ups, President Obama claimed, "There may have been folks who have been affected in ways that they weren’t happy about -- by the law. That is a far smaller number than the millions of people who’ve been signed up."
But according to every poll that has asked the American people about Obamacare, that is just not true.
Take the recent Kaiser Health Tracking Poll, a poll conducted by an organization (the Kaiser Family Foundation) entirely sympathetic to Obama and Obamacare. Kaiser found that while just 18 percent of Americans say they have benefited from Obamacare, 30 percent say they have been "negatively affected."
Kaiser even asked respondents to identify how specifically they have benefited or been harmed by Obamacare.
Of those saying they had benefited from Obamacare, 50 percent said they were enjoying an increase in access to health insurance, while 25 percent credited the law with lowering their health care costs.
But among those who have been harmed by Obamacare, 54 percent said the law increased their health care costs, 9 percent said it decreased their options/choices, and 8 percent said they opposed the individual mandate. Surprisingly, just 6 percent of those claiming they have been harmed by Obamacare cited insurance policy cancellations as the cause.
Few other polls ask detailed follow up questions like Kaiser does, but recent MSNBC, The Washington Post, and USA Today polls all found that more Americans say Obamacare has had a negative impact on their lives, than say it has had a positive impact.
Obama and his Democratic allies may prioritize the expansion of health care coverage above all other health care policy concerns, but the American people clearly have a different view.
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