Claim: After Massachusetts passed a mandatory health insurance law "their mortality rate went down...it saved lives.
Verdict: SUPPORTS

Retrieved passages:
title: Salvatore DiMasi
text: law. In April 2006, Governor Mitt Romney signed the first-in-the-nation universal health insurance bill into law. As a result of the law, Massachusetts reduced the number of uninsured adults by nearly half within the first year of mandatory health coverage and increased the percentage of people receiving routine preventive care, according to the first major study of the 2006 law conducted by the Urban Institute. In 2007, Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick submitted a bill that would allow the construction and operation of three resort-style casinos in the state. He argued that these casinos would generate $2 billion for the state

title: Health insurance mandate
text: required individuals, and not employers, to buy insurance, as an alternative to Clinton's plan. Hillary Clinton's plan in 2008 also included an individual mandate. An individual health-insurance mandate was initially enacted on a state level: the 2005 Massachusetts health care reform law. In 2006, Republican Mitt Romney, then governor of Massachusetts, signed an individual mandate into law with strong bipartisan support. In 2007, a Senate bill featuring a federal mandate, authored by Bob Bennett (R-UT) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), attracted substantial bipartisan support. , more than 97 percent of Massachusetts residents were insured, which made it the state with the

title: Health insurance mandate
text: lowest percentage of people without health insurance. Before the law was passed, per capita health care costs in Massachusetts were the highest for any part of the country except D.C. From 2003 to 2008 (three years prior and two years after enactment) Massachusetts insurance premiums continued to outpace the rest of United States, however the rate of growth year to year for Massachusetts has slowed as a result of the law. New Jersey adopted an individual healthcare insurance mandate effective January 1, 2019, whereas other states provide community rating and guaranteed issue without mandates. Romney's success in installing an individual

title: King v. Burwell
text: challenge to the act. The Court noted that previous attempts to reform health care insurance "encouraged people to wait until they got sick to buy insurance" resulting in "an economic 'death spiral': premiums rose, the number of people buying insurance declined, and insurers left the market entirely." It further noted that in 2006 "Massachusetts discovered a way to make the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements work—by requiring individuals to buy insurance and by providing tax credits to certain individuals to make insurance more affordable." and that "the Affordable Care Act adopts a version of the three key reforms that

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: health care industry price controls were passed in August 2012, and the employer mandate was repealed in 2013 in favor of the federal mandate (even though enforcement of the federal mandate was delayed until January 2015). Because Mitt Romney was the governor of Massachusetts at the time, the law has colloquially been called Romneycare, a reference to the nicknaming of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as "Obamacare". Among its many effects, the law established an independent public authority, the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority, also known as the Massachusetts Health Connector. The Connector acts as an insurance broker

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: also illustrates the long-term decrease in ESI, and an increase in public, free and subsidized insurance. In the early years of the implementation of the law, approximately 2% of those eligible were determined not to have had access to affordable insurance, and a small number opted for a religious exemption to the mandate. Approximately 1% of taxpayers were determined by the Commonwealth to have had access to affordable insurance during tax year 2009 (latest data available), and had to pay an income tax penalty instead. Comparing the first half of 2007 to the first half of 2009, spending from the

title: Health care reforms proposed during the Obama administration
text: die because of lack of medical care were estimated in a 1997 analysis to be nearly 100,000 per year. A study of the effects of the Massachusetts universal health care law (which took effect in 2006) found a 3% drop in mortality among people 20–64 years old - 1 death per 830 people with insurance. Other studies, just as those examining the randomized distribution of Medicaid insurance to low-income people in Oregon in 2008, found no change in death rate. The cost of insurance has been a primary motivation in the reform of the US healthcare system, and many different

title: Governorship of Mitt Romney
text: In particular, Romney successfully pushed for incorporating an individual mandate at the state level. U.S. Senator from Massachusetts Edward M. Kennedy, who had made universal health coverage his life's work, gave Romney's plan a positive reception, which encouraged Democratic legislators to work with it. The effort eventually gained the support of all major stakeholders within the state, and Romney helped break a logjam between rival Democratic leaders in the legislature. On April 12, 2006, Romney signed legislation that mandates that nearly all Massachusetts residents buy or obtain health insurance coverage or face a penalty (up to approximately $2000 for 2008

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: on the insurance reform. Based on the combination of the increased Health Safety Net tax, general revenue (state income and sales taxes were increased 20%) and smaller additional taxes, the cost of the reform reached about 2% of the state's annual budget in fiscal year 2013, which ended June 30, 2013, up from 1.5% in fiscal 2011. Data following enactment of mandatory insurance showed total emergency visits and spending continued to increase, and low-severity emergency visits decreased less than 2%; researchers concluded, "To the extent that policymakers expected a substantial decrease in overall and low-severity ED visits, this study does

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: period in question, and their overall findings are "incompatible with claims that health reform has cut medical bankruptcy filings significantly." A 2015 study found that the law had "modest effects" on costs of outpatient care for people who were already insured. During the week of April 5, 2010, "The Boston Globe" reported that more than a thousand people in Massachusetts had "gamed" the mandate/penalty provision of the law since implementation by choosing to be insured only a few months a year, typically when in need of a specific medical procedure. On the average, the Globe reported, these part-time enrolees were

title: Mitt Romney
text: who, over time, had developed a warm relationship with Romney, gave the plan a positive reception, which encouraged Democratic legislators to cooperate. The effort eventually gained the support of all major stakeholders within the state, and Romney helped break a logjam between rival Democratic leaders in the legislature. On April 12, 2006, the governor signed the resulting Massachusetts health reform law, commonly called "Romneycare", which requires nearly all Massachusetts residents to buy health insurance coverage or face escalating tax penalties, such as the loss of their personal income tax exemption. The bill also established means-tested state subsidies for people who

title: Health care reforms proposed during the Obama administration
text: that health care providers inevitably capture and use to increase the required level of insurance" and state that providers were successful in persuading legislators to include an additional 16 benefit mandates in the required benefit package during the first three years after the coverage mandate was enacted. They also say that by prohibiting the use of health status in pricing, the Massachusetts law "further increase[s] premiums for the young and healthy" and, as the result of adverse selection, drives more comprehensive health plans out of the market. The conclusion they draw is that "[T]he most sweeping provision . . .

title: Health care reforms proposed during the Obama administration
text: said that, to keep premiums from rising for everyone, it is necessary for healthier people to pay into the insurance pools to balance out the cost of these higher cost individuals. Arguing against requiring individuals to buy coverage, the Cato Institute has asserted that the Massachusetts law forcing everyone to buy insurance has increased costs: "Premiums are growing 21 to 46 percent faster than the national average, in part because Massachusetts' individual mandate has effectively outlawed affordable health plans." They say that "the mandate gives politicians enormous power to dictate the content of every American's health plan – a power

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: penalty. In 2007, the penalty was the loss of the personal exemption. Beginning in 2008, the penalty is half the cost of the lowest available yearly premium which will be enforced as an assessed addition to the individual's income tax. Beginning July 2007, the Connector offered reduced benefit plans for young adults up to age 26 who do not have access to employer-based coverage. In 2008 and 2010, much more substantive changes were made to the law, one of the most important of which was to begin an open enrollment period for those receiving subsidized health insurance and anyone buying

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: program. A 2011 view of the data, released by the state in 2013, shows the number of people receiving employer-sponsored insurance (ESI) in Massachusetts has decreased by approximately 500,000 people (about 8% of the state population) since the enactment of the Massachusetts health insurance law in 2006. (The state of Massachusetts stopped putting out regular information on various types of insurance enrollment altogether between 2011 and 2013; prior to 2011, it released such data quarterly. In 2013, the state released 2011 data.) The latest U.S. Census data on health care insurance types in Massachusetts was released in September 2012, and

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: to offer free, highly subsidized and full-price private insurance plans to residents, including through its web site. As such it is one of the models of the Affordable Care Act's health insurance exchanges. The 2006 Massachusetts law successfully covered approximately two-thirds of the state's then-uninsured residents, half via federal-government-paid-for Medicaid expansion (administered by MassHealth) and half via the Connector's free and subsidized network-tiered health care insurance for those not eligible for expanded Medicaid. Relatively few Massachusetts residents used the Connector to buy full-priced insurance. The healthcare insurance reform law was enacted as Chapter 58 of the Acts of 2006 of

title: Political positions of Mitt Romney
text: that he was "willing to vote for things that [he was] not wild with". As governor of Massachusetts in 2006, Romney proposed and signed into law a private, market-based reform that ensures every Massachusetts citizen will have health insurance, without a government takeover and without raising taxes. The law secured near-universal health care coverage. The legislation requires health insurance for all state residents, provided a plan is available to the individual that deemed affordable according to state standards. Employers with eleven or more employees are mandated to offer approved insurance plans for employees. Romney vetoed eight sections of the legislation,

title: Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
text: was at first lauded by Republicans. During Romney's 2008 presidential campaign, Senator Jim DeMint praised Romney's ability to "take some good conservative ideas, like private health insurance, and apply them to the need to have everyone insured". Romney said of the individual mandate: "I'm proud of what we've done. If Massachusetts succeeds in implementing it, then that will be the model for the nation." In 2007, a year after the Massachusetts reform, Republican Senator Bob Bennett and Democratic Senator Ron Wyden introduced the Healthy Americans Act, which featured an individual mandate and state-based, regulated insurance markets called "State Health Help

title: Massachusetts health care reform
text: April–May 2010 as the current government tried to keep the leading non-profit insurers, which insure over 90% of the residents, in the state from raising premiums for small businesses and individuals. Eventually the state's non-partisan insurance board ruled that the government did not have the actuarial data or right to freeze the premiums. Five of the non-profit insurers then settled for slightly lower premium increases than they had initially requested rather than litigate further. The sixth litigated and won the right to implement all its original increases retroactively. Payment rates were supposed to be increased to hospitals and physicians under

title: Health care in the United States
text: the study. A study done at Harvard Medical School with Cambridge Health Alliance showed that nearly 45,000 annual deaths are associated with a lack of patient health insurance. The study also found that uninsured, working Americans have an approximately 40% higher mortality risk compared to privately insured working Americans. In 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) became law, enacting major changes in health insurance. The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of most of the law in June 2012 and affirmed insurance exchange subsidies in all states in June 2015. A study by the Agency for Healthcare Research