FixHealthCarePolicy

Six Ways the Senate Health Care Bill Raises Health Care Costs, Kills Jobs, and Weakens the Economy

On the eve of the House of Representatives push to jam through the misguided and highly unpopular Senate health care bill, the President continues to try and convince the American people that the health care bill would reduce cost while showing his commitment to creating jobs and improving the economy. The raw facts make it clear that he cannot keep either of these promises. For example:

– The President claims the health care proposals would reduce health care spending. The reality is health care spending would increase. According to the latest Congressional Budget Office report of the Senate bill, health care spending under the Senate bill would increase by $210 billion over the next 10 years. This is similar to the results found by the President’s chief actuary which estimated an increase of $222 billion. While CBO predicts spending would decrease in the second decade, history shows spending rarely, if ever, goes down on government health programs. Medicare is hurtling toward a financial crisis, and Medicaid is breaking state budgets. (more…)

Tags: Medicare "donut hole", President's chief actuary, President's health proposal, reconciliation, senate health care bill

Praising the Senate Health Bill: Worldly Wisdom or Nunsense?

As the beneficiary of 16 years of Catholic education, eight of them under the tutelage of the Sisters of Charity in Cincinnati, I am inclined by habit to nod in swift concurrence whenever the good sisters speak. Not today.

A letter released yesterday by 60 leaders of Catholic women’s religious orders argues that the Senate-passed version of health care reform does not provide for funding of elective abortion and is thus the “REAL [capitalization in original] pro-life” option. The Catholic bishops, the non-sectarian National Right to Life Committee and, this morning, the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious strongly disagree.

The dispute has emerged with greater force after it became clear last week that any commitment by the Democratic leadership in Congress to “fix” the Senate bill’s defective abortion limitation language was unenforceable – a piecrust promise. Not only would the Senate’s traditionally stronger corps of anti-Hyde amendment votes ensure defeat of any abortion language fix, but 41 Republican senators signed a letter to oppose any policy-making on the reconciliation bill that would ferry the fix to enactment – a pledge that clearly would include the doomed abortion limitation. (more…)

Tags: catholic bishops, nuns, piecrust promise, Senate Health Bill, taxpayer-funded abortions, women's religious orders

Morning Bell: What the Senate Bill Would Do To America

Another day, another no-show for the Obamacare reconciliation bill. House Democrats were quick to shift blame to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) with Rep. Robert Andrews telling The Hill that the delay “has been much more technical than substantive. … It’s not like what tax has to go or what spending has to go.” Which is an interesting claim, since Politico reported that AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka was summoned to the White House yesterday afternoon “to discuss a higher-than-expected excise tax on some health care plans.” In fact, Politico added: “A labor source said Trumka’s meeting would focus on the entire bill, not just the excise tax question.” Sounds like more than just technical details are still in flux.

But in reality, none of these discussions really matter. The reconciliation bill being drafted is nothing more than thin political cover for House Democrats who believe the Senate bill is terrible public policy but want to please their leadership and the President by voting for it anyway. As we detailed yesterday, there is no bill but the Senate bill. Once the House passes the Senate bill, the President will sign it. Game over. It has been almost three months since the Senate passed their bill in the dead of night on Christmas Eve. A review of just how terrible it really is, is in order:

New Middle-Class Taxes: Throughout his campaign, President Barack Obama promised he would not raise taxes on American households making less than $250,000. The Senate bill shatters that promise. For starters, just look at the reason Trumka went to the White House yesterday: the excise tax on high-cost health insurance plans. This tax would overwhelmingly hit middle-class taxpayers. Taxes on prescription drugs, wheel chairs and other medical devices would also be passed on to all consumers, hitting the lower- and middle- classes the hardest. (more…)

Tags: Congressional Budget Office, deficits, excise tax, higher health costs, higher health premiums, middle class taxes, ObamaCare, reconciliation bill, unemployment

The Senate Health Bill: Ordinary Americans Have Been Warned

As the House of Representatives prepares for a final round of debate on the health care legislation, ordinary Americans must grasp the huge impact on the future of the country. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is pulling out all the stops to get the 216 votes needed to pass the Senate health bill, H.R. 3590 (PDF). The Speaker is also promising to fix the Senate bill’s many objectionable components later through the budget reconciliation process, parliamentary rules normally used to reconcile tax and spending provisions with the annual congressional budget resolution.

Meanwhile, the House leadership is also reportedly pursuing the controversial “Slaughter Rule,” in which the entire Senate bill be “deemed” to have passed the House without an “up or down” vote on the Senate language.

Regardless of whatever procedural shenanigans the House leadership tries to play, the end result would be enactment of the Senate health bill as the law of the land. That’s the end game. Period. (more…)

Tags: additional insurance costs, Congressional Budget Office, deem, Medicaid Expansion, reconciliation, Senate Health Bill, Slaugher Rule