Harvard professors loved Obamacare; but now that it’s hit their wallets - they balk

Harvard University professors loved the ideals of a collective national health insurance co-op, until it hit their pocketbooks. Now, Obamacare isn’t sitting so well with them as they see their health insurance costs spike because of the Affordable Care Act.

The New York Times reports:

For years, Harvard’s experts on health economics and policy have advised presidents and Congress on how to provide health benefits to the nation at a reasonable cost. But those remedies will now be applied to the Harvard faculty, and the professors are in an uproar.

Members of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the heart of the 378-year-old university, voted overwhelmingly in November to oppose changes that would require them and thousands of other Harvard employees to pay more for health care. The university says the increases are in part a result of the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act, which many Harvard professors championed.

The faculty vote came too late to stop the cost increases from taking effect this month, and the anger on campus remains focused on questions that are agitating many workplaces: How should the burden of health costs be shared by employers and employees? If employees have to bear more of the cost, will they skimp on medically necessary care, curtail the use of less valuable services, or both?

“Harvard is a microcosm of what’s happening in health care in the country,” said David M. Cutler, a health economist at the university who was an adviser to President Obama’s 2008 campaign. But only up to a point: Professors at Harvard have until now generally avoided the higher expenses that other employers have been passing on to employees. That makes the outrage among the faculty remarkable, Mr. Cutler said, because “Harvard was and remains a very generous employer.”

The New York Times article, headlined “Health Care Fixes Backed by Harvard’s Experts Now Roil Its Faculty,” is quickly making the rounds today, with citations on The Washington Post as well as Forbes, where writer Michael F. Cannon quipped: “As an irony junkie, this New York Times article on the outrage among Harvard’s faculty that they should face greater cost-sharing in their health benefits — and the incredulity of Harvard’s health economists at their colleagues’ reactions — is one of the most wonderful things I have read in the course of my career.”

Read the full article.

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