MIT Professor and Obamacare architect Jonathan Gruber faced the House Oversight Committee on Tuesday. Chairman Darrell Issa began the hearing by invoking Forrest Gump, asking Gruber, "Are You Stupid?"
Gruber famously was caught on tape describing the American people as stupid and revealing that the Affordable Care Act was purposely made vague so people wouldn't know for what they were voting. Issa used Gruber's statements to back the M.I.T professor into a corner:
Issa: Thank you. Mr. Gruber, I’ve been accused that I’m going to berate you or something, and I hope that you won't feel that way when I get done. But the night before last, I was at the Kennedy Center Honors, where they honored Tom Hanks, famously Forest Gump, the ultimate in a successful stupid man. Are you stupid?
Gruber: I don't think so, no.
Issa: Does M.I.T. employ stupid people?
Gruber: Not to my knowledge.
Issa: Okay. So you're a smart man who said some, as the ranking member said, some really stupid things. And you said the same. Is that correct?
Gruber: I -- the comments I made were really inexcusable.
Issa: Okay. And I’ll leave aside the political observations. But, you did say in your -- in the video we played and everyone else has seen, I think, parts of it, you did say that, in fact, if people knew the whole truth they wouldn't have voted for this. That, in fact, the direction you were going, the reality, and specifically I want to talk, as Mr. Goldmann is a poster child for this, he has a silver plan that is relatively inexpensive. If it was subsidized it would be even cheaper. But the shifting of some people to pay more than they previously did, because remember health care went up in price, so for Mr. Goldmann to get a reduction, somebody else got not only an increase, but an increase to offset his decrease. That was what you were talking about. So isn't it true that, in fact, between the taxes, and increases for some, that's part of the plan to reduce for people like Mr. Goldmann?
Gruber: The -- first of all, I made a critical mistake in trying to conjecture with a tone of expertise --
Issa: No, but you're an expert on the analysis of the numbers and where the cost shifting goes in your microeconomic analysis. And I’m asking you as Dr. Gruber, a smart man, a smart man at a great institution, that has collected over -- or actually over $4 million in various fees and so on, your analysis, isn't it true that in order for Mr. Goldmann to get his reduction, and he's very happy about it, that, in fact, it was cost-shifting including those so-called Cadillac plans. Isn't that true?
Gruber: The affordable care act set up insurance exchanges which pooled risks for the healthy and less healthy. On average, when you account for the tax credits individuals received people are paying less for health insurance than --
Issa: I'm a taxpayer, Mr. Gruber. Trust me, people are not paying less. People like me are paying more for those, because taxes are, in fact, a cost that's paid. Total cost did not go down; cost shifting occurred in your model, isn't that true?
Gruber: The amount that individuals have to pay for health insurance on average fell in my model.
The questioning went on with Issa asking Gruber, in light of the statements he made about the lack of transparency, why should they believe his economic modeling.
