The phone is quite capable in 2016 but I wouldn't recommend it just for the fact that it has a 3 year old 2100 mAh battery (small) and a chance the digitizer may fail like in your case (possibly age related). It might be worth it if you can snag a used one for $50.

I looked at these two phones recently for under $150:

Blu Energy X ($109) - Near stock 5.0, 4000 mAh battery but only 1GB ram, 8GB storage & 8 MP camera, don't expect updates

Xiaomi Redmi Note 2 ($139) - Not Amazon but good specs: 2GB ram, 16GB storage, 13 MP camera, uses a modified 5.0 android system called MIUI