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Exchange shoppers pick price over choice

Consumers shopping on the exchanges are thriftier than the general public, with more picking health plans based on price rather than their choice of doctors.

By Caroline Chen | Updated on February 27, 2014
Yuvania Maldonado, an In Person Counselor for PPACA speaks with taxi driver Mohammad Chaudri. (AP Photo/M. Spencer Green)

Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) — Consumers shopping on the Obamacare exchanges are thriftier than the general public, with more picking health plans based on price rather than their choice of doctors, a study found.

While the general public prefers more expensive plans that cover a broader range of doctors and hospitals, 54 percent of those who are uninsured or who buy their own coverage select plans that cost less, even if they have less say in providers, the Kaiser Family Foundation found in a poll released today. Only 35 percent of that group — the target audience of the exchanges set up by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — would pick a more expensive, broad-network plan.

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