>>>The Manhattan Institute just published a study across 3,000 counties that the cost of individually-purchased health insurance rose by 41% over 2013.
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>And the National Bureau of Economic Research also published a paper by a top-rated economist who is not trying to score political points. He identified more modest increases *before taking account of subsidies* and cited credible causes that did not include blaming Obama. For example, he identifies that insurers no longer can hunt for evidence of pre-existence or resile or impose cost ceilings if a health catastrophe strikes. All very well to assess cost when everything is peachy, but what about when the proverbial hits the fan- which is what insurance is supposed to be about. IMHO it's likely that medical bills as a principal cause of middle class bankruptcy will change now, something that reasonably ought to be factored into a cost assessment.
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>Your other problem is that before O'Care the US already paid far more than everybody else but got worse care according to the Commonwealth Institute. So if costs really were rising by another 41%, then there's not just an elephant but a whole herd in the room. Blaming Obama is easy but he is not an elephant.

I saw another study recently - I can't find the link - that showed that the number of insured adults in the US has dropped since the onset of O'Care. It also found that the dodging of the plan by well young people has not in fact materialized at the expected rate.
It's too soon to draw any conclusions either way, but if those trends actually materialize over time, it will have achieved some of its key goals.
Cost control is another matter. People continue to game the system. I live in a retirement community where just about everyone is on Medicare. Medicare will pay a foot MD to clip a patient's toenails every 90 days.
Several foot MD's have set up offices near our community and just clip toenails at MD rates all day at Medicare's expense.
Younger people down the street are paying immigrants working for minimum wage in nail salons to do the same thing to their toenails.