The Affordable Care Act (aka "Obamacare") was designed to expand health insurance coverage and hold down the cost of insurance, but it will also change incomes of many Americans according to initial projections of Brookings Senior FellowsHenry Aaron and Gary Burtless.

In their new, preliminary paper "Potential Effects of the Affordable Care Act on Income Inequality," Aaron and Burtless find sizeable income gains in the bottom quarter of the income distribution offset by small losses spread across higher income groups. Their estimates are ...