The last effective obstacle to health care reform crumbled today when the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office released its eagerly-awaited fiscal analysis on President Obama's 2,300-page health care bill. The official verdict is very, very good:
- President Obama's health care reform bill would:
- Reduce the U.S. deficit by $130 billion over the next decade;
- Reduce the U.S. deficit by $1.2 trillion in the second decade of implementation;
- Cost $940 billion over the first ten years;
- Will extend coverage to 32 million uninsured Americans.
- Reduce Medicare growth by 1.4 percentage points annually, while extending "Medicare's solvency by at least 9 years."
Democratic leadership is elated, as they should be. House Majority Whip James Clyburn, who is officially tasked with keeping tabs of the votes, told Fox News today, "We are absolutely giddy... This is great news for the American people."
The next House step is to prepare to vote. Per The Hill in the last hours, "The release of the CBO score sets into motion a 72-hour endgame on healthcare. Leaders have said they will give members 72 hours to review the legislation before a vote."
The fiscally favorable CBO scoring of President Obama's health care reform package firmly counters all rational, non-ideological Republican objections to the legislation.
Of course, other obstacles could still cause this legislation to not be passed by the House. Given Republicans' intense ideological opposition to granting semi-subsidized coverage to millions of uninsured Americans, and to mandating that all Americans carry health insurance, consrvatives will do absolutely anything to derail this bill.
But with ultra-liberal Rep. Dennis Kucinich's decision to switch his vote to YEA from NAY, and with the favorable CBO fiscal-impact scores, House Democrats should reasonably be able to muster the votes to pass the package of changes and "fixes" to the Senate health care reform bill.
House passage of the bill of changes and "fixes" to the Senate bill is deemed equivalent to direct passage of the Senate health care bill. (For explanation, see The 'Self Executing Rule' and the Health Care Bill.)
President Obama could then almost immediately sign into law health care reform legislation... a prospect that Democrats have been striving for and dreaming of since Franklin D. Roosevelt was President.
Today is a very good day in and for America!
To all chagrined conservatives, I remind them: elections matter. And Barack Obama won handily in 2008, as did Democrats in both houses of Congress. The American people spoke loudly and clearly for reform of America's egregious, greedy health care system.
And President Obama and Democratic leaders are on the historic verge of delivering to the voters exactly what they voted for in 2008.
- Essentials
- First Year Changes Under Obama's Health Care Reform Bill
- Paul Krugman Debunks Obama Health Care Bill Myths
- Obama's Landmark Health Care Reform Speech to Congress
(Photo taken on Sept 9, 2009 as President Obama delivered his landmark health care reform speech to a joint session of Congress in which he urged them to pass health care reform legislation. The speech proved to be a turning point in in the decades-long Democratic drive for health care for all Americans: Jason Reed/Getty Images)
Comments
Amen.
Changes to insurance are clearly overdue. Once in place, any attempt on the part of Republicans to take them away will be politically suicidal. And if they try to take away the mandate component — which might have some popular appeal — they will face the wrath of the insurance industry in a way never before seen. It may be short of all we want, but this bill is made to stick. The only meaningful alternative will be a single-payer system with private insurance selling boutique policies to those who can afford to buy.
No one today recalls that prior to the Sixties all hospitals were non-profit BY LAW. Over the last four or five decades the non-profit hospitals have morphed into a symbiotic incestuous money-laundering scheme servicing the profit-driven sectors of health care. America’s experiment with mixing health care and uncontrolled free market economics has proved to be a train wreck. This legislation is the first nail in the profit-making coffin of those who regard health care as a market commodity.
When the dust settles, years from now, medical professionals will once again be handsomely and safely compensated because they will no longer be in competition for money with share-holders, marketing budgets, executive bonuses, depreciation schedules and all the other baggage that comes with making profits.
High-end dental care and cosmetic surgery will remain safe and become even more lucrative, along with athletic and company physicians as well as specialists in every field.
This is looooong overdue
.
Is it true that taxes and fees will be paid in for the first 4 years and the actual benefits do not start until year 5 ?? Does this means it takes 10 years of taxes to pay for 6 years of benefits ?? How can you add 32 million new people into the system and not increase premiums ? Can you imagine what the wait is going to be like in the Doctor’s office after this passes. And I am sure the quality of care is going to be a lot better. Just ask the people in England or Canada. Well, I know we can trust the Government’s estimates to be right on the money. They are always on budget. This plan is so good that I understand all government officials and employees are dropping their current medical plan and so that they can get into this new plan.
ALLEN –
“Is it true that taxes and fees will be paid in for the first 4 years and the actual benefits do not start until year 5 ??”
No, it’s not true. There are considerable benefits that accrue after six months. Here’s the list:
http://usliberals.about.com/od/healthcare/a/HealthCareFirstYear.htm
Allen, it’s easy to be confused because the package is so big. Don’t make the mistake of imagining that “taxes” and “fees” equals “benefits” dollar for dollar. That is the misleading opposition rhetoric at work. I’ll try to clear up a couple of points.
The late Senator Kennedy’s CLASS Act (Community Living Assistance Services and Supports) is included in some form which will immediately begin collecting four years of “contributions” via payroll taxes along with the already in place Social Security and Medicare collections. The “benefit” will be a long-term care safety net for all who participate (I think it will be automatic enrollment with an “oppt out” provision for those who don’t wish ti participate). In the event of the need for long-term skilled nursing care (i.e. nursing home) the benefit is a daily cash disbursement aimed at covering most of the cost. That feature will be revenue neutral, or sel-paying once started, hence the four-year wait. (Also, those who opt out will not be allowed to wait until the need is upon them and sign up at the last minute, gaming the system. A four-year participation will be part of the requirement.)
In order to foot part of the bill a tax will take effect four years out in the form of a sur-tax on “unearned income” for taxpayers whose income exceeds two hundred thousand dollars a year. Many of the richest people in America pay no income taxes because their income is derived from tax-exempt or other investments instead of earned income. That tax will get income from that group.
Although several of the insurance rules will go into place at once, some of the biggies have been delayed four years in order for the exchanges to be built and risk pools to stabilize. Otherwise the industry would be in an unpredictable mess overnight with no way to plan a survival strategy.
I’m only a layman and all that I just put down is from memory so do your own homework. I have been studying this legislation from the start and watched in dismay as some of the most creative and important parts have been eviscerated by this or that special interest. The final package is a pale imitation of what I would truly like and it is virtually a Republican product (if you can believe that). But thanks to an over-accommodating president and some really hard-headed Republicans who even now continue to oppose the whole thing, it’s the best we have.
I saw poor Virginia Foxx on C-SPAN this afternoon and thought to myself, if that’s what the opposition is down to, they are in sad shape. She’s a Republican analogue of Cynthia McKinney if there ever was one.
The CBO “findings” are based on the smoke and mirrors provided by Obama and his comrades to the CBO.
Obama and his comrades are using deception, gimmicks, creative accounting, smoke and mirrors to hide the trillions of dollars their scam will cost us. What they are giving the CBO to consider is only PART of the scam, while the most expensive parts of the scam are hidden under other bills or passed to the states (which we will still have to pay).
“Legislative Reality vs, Political Reality,” by Peter Suderman, identifies specific deceptive strategies. One of the strategies entails shifting expensive parts of a bill to completely DIFFERENT pieces of legislation. So the costs found by the CBO will be only PART of the costs.
In the House, Democrats shifted an expensive, unpaid-for “fix” to doctor’s Medicare reimbursement rates over to a separate bill. And in the Senate, they backloaded the spending so that its full effects would not be felt in the 10-year window that CBO scores. In the latest Senate bill, 99 percent of the spending would occur in the last six years of the budget window.
http://reason.com/archives/2009/12/10/legislative-reality-vs-politic
Obamacare will dramatically increase taxes, costs and the deficit while rationing and destroying health care, destroying businesses and jobs, and destroying our economy and our freedoms.
As the Obama campaign was funded largely by U.S. enemies like George Soros, it seems Obama and his comrades are trying to repay them by destroying our country!
I realize the Fox kool-ade is intoxicating, but I never attribute to malice that which can be easily explained by ignorance.
Next time, do a little homework before passing along misinformation.
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contriball.php?cycle=2008
That December link to a Reason article is waaay out of date. A more recent comment at that same site quotes Ezra Klein that “This year, the Obama administration succeeded at neutralizing every single industry. Pharma supports the bill. Insurers are incoherent on it, but there’s not a ferocious and united campaign to kill the proposal. The American Medical Association has endorsed the Senate bill. The hospitals have endorsed the bill. Labor has endorsed the bill. The business community is split, with larger employers holding their fire.”
Looks to me like a Who’s Who of the country’s biggest and most conservative related industries. I’m no big fan of what’s happening. I’m with Kucinich for single-payer, but that was never on the table so my support for what is about to happen is barely luke-warm.
What happens next will be another generation leaning to take the new safety nets for granted while for-profit leeches suck blood. In time (after I’m gone, I’m sure) the whole system will reach critical mass and a single-payer system will be all that remains as Medicare, Medicaid, the VA, and C.L.A.S.S. Act beneficiaries leave private health insurance in the boutique business.
Churchill was right when he said “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing… after everything else has been tried first.”
The CBO’s numbers are a joke, its score just a function of manipulating the methodology the CBO is required to use. As I’ve said before, this health bill would make an Enron accountant blush. Its grotesquely dishonest to say the bill will do anything other than massively increase the deficit.
Among its many accounting tricks and lies…
1. It collects 10 years of taxes to pay 6 years of benefits. Someone earlier claimed some benefits kick in 6 months, but the amounts are tiny in the context of the larger bill. Years 11 – 20 create a deficit of about $2.3 trillion using realistic assumptions. Even if you accrue the first 4 years’ taxes and apply them to years 5 – 14 and use that as the 10 year analysis period, its massively underwater.
2. It counts Medicare cuts that will never, never happen. The bill counts $380 billion in Medicare cuts to doctors that were mandated in a law passed back in the 90’s. Every year since, Congress has deferred these cuts. Were they implemented, according to Medicare itself, a sizable portion of doctors would stop seeing Medicare patients or go bankrupt. (or both) That this is a lie became clear when Congress recently deferred the cuts till later this year. They were to kick in March 1st. If the bill passes, as seems likely, Democrats will have to vote to implement these cuts right before the November elections.
3. It counts, in the first 10 years, $74 billion in premiums on long term care as free money to offset other costs. They can do this because the benefits on long term care don’t kick in till after the first 10 years. They are stealing money from future periods to make the first 10 years look better. In a private insurance company, they invest the premiums to pay future claims. If an insurance company did what this bill does, they would be immediately seized by the appropriate state regulator.
And on, and on….
Not that liberals care in their insane quest for the health care holy grail, but it will also cause private insurance rates to soar and dramatically reduce the quality of care. Caterpillar just this week estimates an additional $100 million per year cost for its company plan. Massachusetts implemented a plan largely identical to the basic features of the pending health bill. MA’s insurance rates have soared to the highest in the nation. In a bid to control costs, MA governor is preparing to implement a rationing system. European countries have far worse survival rates for cancer. Canada’s single payer system requires waiting months or years for basic procedures. The low fines for employers not offering coverage will encourage companies to drop coverage and dump people into the taxpayer subsidised exchanges. Finally, and ultimately, there is a deep flaw in forcing your neighbors to pay for your health care. Milton Friedman explained it far better than I…
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704784904575111273624979544.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular
This comment is wrong on so many levels it would be a waste of time to correct them all. I’m having flashbacks to 1963, trying to speak rationally with my Southern brothers and sisters (even my own parents) regarding bleeding inequities about to be corrected by civil rights legislation the following year.
One point jumps off the page…
They are stealing money from future periods to make the first 10 years look better. In a private insurance company, they invest the premiums to pay future claims. If an insurance company did what this bill does, they would be immediately seized by the appropriate state regulator.
Where were you when Congress began that same accounting years ago with Social Security revenue? Receipts from Social Security payroll taxes have been running surpluses over the needs of Social Security for YEARS and still do. Yet the revenue is pissed away by Congress as part of the general fund, replacing it by government bonds which George Bush referred to as “IOU’s” in a file cabinet in West Virginia.
I don’t approve of that kind of accounting either, but I’m not in charge. What’s sauce for the goose is good for the gander. If we have money to wage wars off the books (and need I remind anyone of the global financial crisis of 2008, legacy of the Reagan revolution, thanks very much?) then we surely can find the means fur universal health care.
So don’t get all sanctimonious and righteous about responsible accounting as we stand in the wreckage of a completely failed experiment treating health care as a profit-driven commodity. Prior to the Sixties all hospitals were non-profit by law. The AMA, which stood in solid opposition to the Blues when they first came into existence (Blue Cross first, group insurance for hospital care only, then Blue Shield, group insurance to cover professional services) has lived to see the day when their worst fears have come to pass… Today’s bean-counters, stock analysts and others who haven’t a damn thing to do with the delivery of health care, make no distinction between professional compensation and capital depreciation. All expenses are lumped together and anything that takes away from the profit line is bad.
Why else would the AMA, one of the most retrograde organizations in the country, be in favor of this legislation?
Professional compensation is about to resume it’s rightful place in health care accounting as marketing, executive bonuses, multiple layers of redundant administrative costs and amortization schedules stop hogging the spotlight. Primary care physicians whose importance and compensation have been minimized, will be the new heroes of their profession as specialist increasingly become team members in a better approach to delivering health care. Physicians at all levels, their nursing and technical support staffs and the actual providers of health care (not the brokers, insurance companies) are about to take center stage.
I have been following this debate for two years and have come to the conclusion that the opposition has two problems, denial of the magnitude of the problems we face and a serious lack of imagination. The previous comment is a vivid illustration of both.
See all this time, I thought it was ‘higher math’ I didn’t get. Turns out it’s ‘Democrat Math’ (also known as Liberal Smoke and Mirrors) I don’t get. And here’s why:
According to the CBO, the ‘Historic’ Health Care Bill will reduce the deficit by 130 Billion dollars over ten years. while COSTING 940 Billion dollars over the same ten years. Okay so, if we take 940 away from 130…
Yeah, that’s where I quit reading to… anybody know where I can get a citizenship application to a Democratic country that can do math?
ANYONE who thinks this will do anything other than shoot premiums sky high is kidding themselves. While I do agree we need to help our fellow man why does the entire frickin system have to be overhauled when it currently covers almost everyone who needs it. Take all the money out of the equation and the ramblings of the liberal whack job who wrote the column (and you mention Fox kool-aid), and let’s talk about the fact that BIG government is taking over private industry and a huge one at that. When you stop and realize that the far far majority of the American citizens do not want this mess, George Orwell is laughing at us. Hopefully, some lawsuits will kick in and stop this unconstitutional bill from passing. I don’t like being made to buy something against my will nor will I like to be fined up to 3% of my salary if I don’t buy the correct insurance to pay for the lazy skid down the street who doesn’t feel like working. More importantly, I refuse to finance someone’s abortion.
What are you smoking. Common sense tells you that when you give away so much health care, some one needs to pay the piper!
Here’s what I plan to do until we can throw the bums out:
1. Cancel membership in AARP & Consumers Report for their Liberal support of a stupid bill!
2. Stop all contributions to hospitals, universities and medical research programs. Ask big hearted Obama for more money!
3. Work to rescind AARP’s tax exemption. Get Obama to give them money to stay in business. If they go on the dole, so be it…they need to get a real job and stop bilking the rest of us.
4. Throw the bums out in November. They need a real job too!
5. I’d Promote Obama Impeachment proceedings but then we’d end up with a bigger dope…Biden or Pelossi!
6. Buy a Ford or foreign car. Screw the unions, GM & Chrysler.
7. Support the GOP with $$$$.
8. Repeal Obamacare & support the state that are suing the Federal government because the bill is unconstitutional.
8. Keep an eye the Commie & Socialist groups like ACORN, Working Family Party & Moveon.org as they struggle to survive and make sure they go under also.
I’ll think of more as time goes on!
Wen was the last time the CBO actually got it right? May I remind you about Medicare and medicaid
Just checking back to say I told you so. The ink is barely dry on the ObamaCare train wreck and CBO has already bumped up their cost estimate by a couple hundred billion. Plus, democrats are trying to sneak the reversal of the Medicare doctor cuts into the latest unemployment extension bill.
And then there is the new requirement that every business in America must now send the IRS a 1099 for every business transaction over $600. So if go buy a new Mac at the Apple store for your small business, beginning 2011 you need to send Apple a 1099. That’s billions of 1099’s, literally a mountain of new paperwork.