The crowning jewel in the unveiling of Harry Reid’s health care reform bill was the positive scoring by the Congressional Budget Office. The CBO estimated that H.R 3590 (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) would reduce the deficit by $130 billion over the next ten years. There are, however, several aspects of the report that Harry Reid did not mention.
Tax increases related to the bill are slated to begin in 2010, but coverage will not be available until 2014. Part of the reason that the bill does not add to the deficit in the first 10 years is because during more than a third of that timeframe, revenues are increased but expenditures are not. What will happen in the second decade of the program? The CBO appears to be reluctant to make a projection.
The CBO states that “the total cost of mandates imposed on the private sector, as estimated by CBO and JCT (Joint Committee on Taxation), would greatly exceed the threshold established in UMRA (Unfunded Mandates Reform Act) for private entities ($139 million in 2009, adjusted annually for inflation). The most costly mandates would be the new requirements regarding health insurance coverage that apply to the private sector.”
In addition, the CBO estimates that “the total cost of intergovernmental mandates would greatly exceed the annual threshold established in UMRA for state, local, and tribal entities ($69 million in 2009, adjusted annually for inflation)”.
As has been a concern for senior citizens, much of the savings projected in PPACA come from cuts to Medicare. Payments to physicians will be increased in 2010, but will then be reduced by 23% in 2011 and remain at that level in subsequent years. Rates of payments in the Medicare Advantage program will also be set at a fixed amount, saving approximately $118 billion over the next 10 years. In addition, Medicare and Medicaid payments to hospitals serving a large number of low income patients will be reduced, saving an estimated $43 billion.
The CBO states that in the first decade, premiums for the “public option” will be higher than those for private insurance, which is contrary to one of the main stated goals of health care reform. This may not be the case in the second decade, since fees will be levied on private insurance companies under the bill (as well as on non-generic pharmaceutical companies and medical device manufacturers). Each year, $6.7 billion in fees will be paid by private insurance companies, $2.3 billion by companies producing brand name prescription drugs, and $2 billion by medical device manufacturers. It is uncertain how this is expected to make health care more affordable.
Ultimately, the PPACA will cost American taxpayers $599 billion. While it is possible that it will not add to the deficit, this IS a cost of more than half a trillion dollars that must be funded. In this uncertain economy, with a national debt of $12.2 trillion and unfunded liabilities of $106 trillion, can we really afford this health care reform bill?
Comments
You are wrong on the deficit. Whatever money may be saved (which is doubtful, given the dubious nature of those quoting the figures), that savings is immediately wiped out with a 300 billion dollar rider attached to the bill that will increase medicare reimbursements for doctors in order to attempt to buy off their support. That means the bill actually costs at least 1.2 trillion, but most realistic estimates put it at 2 trillion--an increase in the deficit, an increase in taxes for all, and a trainwreck for America.
Anthony...I don't disagree. I am quoting from the CBO report.
"Anthony...I don't disagree. I am quoting from the CBO report."
Understood.
By the way, welcome to the Columbia Examiner family! I am the Columbia Conservative Examiner. :)
regardless of the bill they pass we are going to have to deal with this www.typobounty.com/Funny/Health_Care_Reform3.htm just be prepared
If anyone, CBO or otherwise, can point to a single major government program that has come in on or under budget I'd like them to point it out to me. Medicare has cost more than 10 times the original estimate. And as you point out, no one seems willing to talk about the cost of this bill beyond the fisrt decade. We can't afford it.
The mythical "savings" and "deficit reductions" to be achieved with Obamacare are based on gimmicks, creative accounting, smoke and mirrors, much like Obama’s "job creation" in districts that don't even exist while unemployment soars!
Part of their creative accounting is to force us to pay more taxes beginning next year, but to begin the "benefits" only after 2012. It's a SCAM, it's FRAUD.
Another gimmick is show "savings" in their budget while forcing the states to cover much of the additional costs. Both the House and the Senate bills require that states cover a larger percentage of their people under Medicaid.
In the end, or course, we would end up paying for it all. We’ll have the “benefit” of paying more taxes, more for insurance, more for medicines, more for medical devices, while receiving rationed care as per the mandates of Obama’s death panels and Obama's Health Care Czar Ezekiel Emanuel, rightfully called "Doctor Death"
The legislation is a financial fraud in claiming $127 billion will be saved in the fist 10 years. Under the Senate plan, the government collects taxes for 10 years but does not start paying benefits until 6 months into 2014 with full benefits not until 2016.
After the first 10 years, there will be a $500 billion revenue short fall for the $500billion reduction in Medicare is ONE TIME ONLY.
One of these days our right wing brothers and sisters will wake up from the right wing coma they've been snoozing under for the last thirty years and realize that they've been getting screwed. I think it's safe to say that Liberals and Conservatives both hate the government. The stark difference is this: Liberals want to fix it. Conservatives want to destroy it. Remember the often quoted goal of Conservative strategist Grover Norquist: their aim is to shrink the government down to the size where they will be able to "drown it in a bathtub." At a time when our population has exceeded the quarter-of-a-billion mark, the very idea of doing away with government is beyond ill advised - it's nuts. In the good old days they were called "Anarchists'. Today they're called "Republican".
Big government? It's a big country. Think about it.
I don't know what kind of health care reform will come out of this session, but I strongly suspect it won't be much.
www.tomdegan.blogspot.com
The mythical "savings" and "deficit reductions" to be achieved with Obamacare are based on gimmicks, creative accounting, smoke and mirrors, much like Obama’s "job creation" in districts that don't even exist while unemployment soars!
Part of their creative accounting is to force us to pay more taxes beginning next year, but to begin the "benefits" only after 2012. It's a SCAM, it's FRAUD.
Another gimmick is show "savings" in their budget while forcing the states to cover much of the additional costs. Both the House and the Senate bills require that states cover a larger percentage of their people under Medicaid.
In the end, or course, we would end up paying for it all. We’ll have the “benefit” of paying more taxes, more for insurance, more for medicines, more for medical devices, while receiving rationed care as per the mandates of Obama’s death panels and Obama's Health Care Czar Ezekiel Emanuel, rightfully called "Doctor Death"
Fortunately, the only Americans who support the criminal Obamacare SCAM (in all its Orwellian, manipulative versions) are Obama's accomplices and those who have been dumbed down by a substandard and politicized education as per the warnings of Soviet defector Yuri Bezmenov. To listen to Bezmenov, google " Bezmenov dailymotion.com video”.
The dumbed down are obviously unable to understand that Obamacare will further contribute to “the American descent into Marxism,” which “is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple…” as the Russians are gloating in Pravda. To read the article, google "107459-american_capitalism”.
Fortunately, most Americans have NOT been dumbed down. Most Americans are not sheeple. Most Americans prefer to be FREE.
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