Obamacare is far from perfect, but for tens of millions of Americans it’s the difference between life and death. I can’t believe how often that point gets lost in the discussion. As if we aren’t all unique people who mean something special to those close to us. People with health insurance don’t face death panels, but people without it potentially face them every day.

I think there are a few economists who read the blog, and it would be appreciated if you could refer me to any studies of what tens of millions of newly insured people will mean to the economy. I would think it would be a boon, but I’d like to read what non-demagogue professionals have to say.

From a new Michael Moore op-ed in the New York Times that looks at both sides of the Affordable Care Act:

“TODAY marks the beginning of health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act’s new insurance exchanges, for which two million Americans have signed up. Now that the individual mandate is officially here, let me begin with an admission: Obamacare is awful.

That is the dirty little secret many liberals have avoided saying out loud for fear of aiding the president’s enemies, at a time when the ideal of universal health care needed all the support it could get. Unfortunately, this meant that instead of blaming companies like Novartis, which charges leukemia patients $90,000 annually for the drug Gleevec, or health insurance chief executives like Stephen Hemsley of UnitedHealth Group, who made nearly $102 million in 2009, for the sky-high price of American health care, the president’s Democratic supporters bought into the myth that it was all those people going to get free colonoscopies and chemotherapy for the fun of it. …

And yet — I would be remiss if I didn’t say this — Obamacare is a godsend. My friend Donna Smith, who was forced to move into her daughter’s spare room at age 52 because health problems bankrupted her and her husband, Larry, now has cancer again. As she undergoes treatment, at least she won’t be in terror of losing coverage and becoming uninsurable. Under Obamacare, her premium has been cut in half, to $456 per month.

Let’s not take a victory lap yet, but build on what there is to get what we deserve: universal quality health care.”