Republicans have made much ado of late over the the McKinsey Study and it’s claim that 30% of employers will stop employees’ health coverage when the ACA is fully implemented in 2014. Having spent several years in the opinion research field, I know how to design studies that will produce whatever results I want. I know how to design an authentic study as well. I can tell the difference between the two by examining the methodology used. Any professional can, and lots of non professionals with common sense could as well. This is not proprietary. There is only one reason a company would refuse to disclose the methodology of a study.

The other day, the consulting company McKinsey released a startling study claiming that 30 percent of employers are planning to stop giving health insurance to their workers as a result of the Affordable Care Act. The study received a good deal [Murdoch delinked] of press coverage and was widely bandied about by conservative politicians and media outlets as proof that conservative warnings about the law are coming to pass. But as a number of critics were quick to point out, McKinsey’s finding is at odds with many other studies — and the company did not release key portions of the study’s methodology, making it impossible to evaluate the study’s validity. There’s now been a new twist in this story. I’m told that the White House, as well as top Democrats on key House and Senate committees, have privately contacted McKinsey to ask for details on the study’s methodology. According to an Obama administration official and a source on the House Ways and Means Committee, the company refused . A spokesperson for McKinsey — which does proprietary research regularly — declined comment… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Washington Post>

The reason McKinsey will not release the methodology is simple. To do so would reveal that the study’s conclusion was predetermined. In other words, it’s a Republican lie intended to defraud America.