House GOP pens 230-page health bill draft

[Councilman]

The Associated Press: House GOP pens 230-page health bill draft

By ERICA WERNER (AP) – 1 hour ago

WASHINGTON — After months spent criticizing Democrats' health overhaul plans, House Republicans have produced a draft proposal of their own. It's much shorter and focuses on bringing down costs rather than extending coverage to nearly all Americans.

A 230-page draft was obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press. A spokeswoman for Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said changes were still being made before the bill would be finalized in time to offer as an alternative when Democrats begin floor debate on their bill, possibly at the end of this week.

The bill leaves out a number of the key features of the Democrats' 1,990-page legislation, such as new requirements for employers to insure their employees and for nearly all Americans to purchase insurance. It also doesn't block insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing health conditions, as Democrats would do.

Instead, the Republican plan increases incentives for people to use health savings accounts, caps non-economic jury awards in medical malpractice cases at $250,000, provides various incentives to states with the aim of driving down premium costs and allows health insurance to be sold across state lines.

Quick show of hands. Will this get a fair shake from the "Lame Stream Obamedia"? Okay I know that in asking the question I place all credibility in question because there is no way this plan will get much more coverage that the inevitable reporting of the criticism form the Socialists/Communists.

I had a question about whether this is a main stream story, a Health Care Story, or an Economic story. Turns out it's all three plus massively political to boot.

 

[Cold Highway]

Hope the post it so we can read it.

 

[Agnapostate]

[T]here is no way this plan will get much more coverage that the inevitable reporting of the criticism form the Socialists/Communists.

Of course it will. The socialists' criticism of the reformist and pseudo-leftist Democrats doesn't make it onto network television or the print media.

 

[American]

Ability to purchase across state lines would be a huge change.

 

[Goobieman]

Quick show of hands. Will this get a fair shake from the "Lame Stream Obamedia"?

The Obamanistas will quickly denounce this as not being a 'real' plan because it doesn't address all the things -they- want addressed.

That is, it doesnt expand government like they want it to.

The fallacy is obvious:
It doesnt have to do everything the Dems want it to do in order to be a "real" plan.

 

[jackalope]

The Associated Press: House GOP pens 230-page health bill draft



Quick show of hands. Will this get a fair shake from the "Lame Stream Obamedia"? Okay I know that in asking the question I place all credibility in question because there is no way this plan will get much more coverage that the inevitable reporting of the criticism form the Socialists/Communists.

I had a question about whether this is a main stream story, a Health Care Story, or an Economic story. Turns out it's all three plus massively political to boot.

It's purely a political story. I heard Boehner say he wasn't putting it on line, and I doubt they plan on getting a CBO score. If they do actually do both of those things, I'll take it seriously. If not, it's a game.

 

[American]

The Obamanistas will quickly denounce this as not being a 'real' plan because it doesn't address all the things they want addressed.

That is, it doesnt expand government like they want it to.

The fallacy is obvious:
It doesnt have to do everything the Dems want it to do in order to be a "real" plan.

It's not thick enough.

 

[Cold Highway]

It's not thick enough.

Then they should use big fonts. :mrgreen:

 

[Scarecrow Akhbar]

The Obamanistas will quickly denounce this as not being a 'real' plan because it doesn't address all the things -they- want addressed.

That is, it doesnt expand government like they want it to.

The fallacy is obvious:
It doesnt have to do everything the Dems want it to do in order to be a "real" plan.

It doesn't matter.

The entire 230 pages may as well be written in cuneiform, since it's not going to be passed.

What is needed isn't the emergency legislation for a non-emergent problem, which is what the Democrat socialists are trying to fob off on us. No, what is needed is a precise statement of the problem and the causes thereof. There's absolutely no point in fixing the problem when the problem hasn't been defined.

All this health-care "debate" nonsense is meaningless. The Democrats want to seize control of a huge sector of the US economy, hence they don't care about what the real problems are or if they're going to be fixed.

 

[American]

It doesn't matter.

The entire 230 pages may as well be written in cuneiform, since it's not going to be passed.

What is needed isn't the emergency legislation for a non-emergent problem, which is what the Democrat socialists are trying to fob off on us. No, what is needed is a precise statement of the problem and the causes thereof. There's absolutely no point in fixing the problem when the problem hasn't been defined.

All this health-care "debate" nonsense is meaningless. The Democrats want to seize control of a huge sector of the US economy, hence they don't care about what the real problems are or if they're going to be fixed.

Now that makes WAY too much sense.

 

[donsutherland1]

IMO, the Republicans should ask the Congressional Budget Office to score their bill. Even as it is intended to be incremental, budget neutrality is important when it comes to helping address the nation's fiscal challenges. Moreover, if the bill makes some progress in taming the rapid growth in national health expenditures--an unsustainable problem in the long-run--it would also make a positive contribution to the health care discussion.

 

[jallman]

It doesn't matter.

The entire 230 pages may as well be written in cuneiform, since it's not going to be passed.

What is needed isn't the emergency legislation for a non-emergent problem, which is what the Democrat socialists are trying to fob off on us. No, what is needed is a precise statement of the problem and the causes thereof. There's absolutely no point in fixing the problem when the problem hasn't been defined.

All this health-care "debate" nonsense is meaningless. The Democrats want to seize control of a huge sector of the US economy, hence they don't care about what the real problems are or if they're going to be fixed.

I just don't buy that. What's the point of seizing a huge sector of the economy if it's just gonna fall into the hands of their opponents when subsequent elections come?

 

[jackalope]

IMO, the Republicans should ask the Congressional Budget Office to score their bill. Even as it is intended to be incremental, budget neutrality is important when it comes to helping address the nation's fiscal challenges. Moreover, if the bill makes some progress in taming the rapid growth in national health expenditures--an unsustainable problem in the long-run--it would also make a positive contribution to the health care discussion.

I agree with this. Then there could be a debate about competing approaches, based in data, what would be impact on budget, what would be impact on health care premiums, what would be impact on uninsureds? And the country would be better off with that approach.

 

[donsutherland1]

For those who are interested, the GOP had the CBO score its health care alternative. The CBO score can be found here: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/107xx/doc10705/hr3962amendmentBoehner.pdf

Briefly, the CBO Score found:

1. The plan would increase the number of covered persons by about 3 million. Keep in mind, the plan is intended to be incremental.

2. The plan would be budget neutral and would modestly reduce overall budget deficits over 10 years.

3. The plan would lead to insurance costs for small businesses being 7%-10% lower than they would otherwise be by 2016. For the large group market (about 80% of covered persons), costs would be 0%-3% lower than they would otherwise be by 2016.

To put this in context, if annual health costs are projected to increase 7%-8% per year (somewhere in the middle of most projections), they would increase by 5.1%-6.7% per year for small businesses and 6.5%-8.0% per year for the large group market. In other words, there would be a modest slowing of growth in health expenditures, mainly for the small business market. However, all those figures would still exceed projected nominal economic growth. Furthermore, estimates for senior citizens were not made.

 

[jackalope]

For those who are interested, the GOP had the CBO score its health care alternative. The CBO score can be found here: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/107xx/doc10705/hr3962amendmentBoehner.pdf

Briefly, the CBO Score found:

1. The plan would increase the number of covered persons by about 3 million. Keep in mind, the plan is intended to be incremental.

2. The plan would be budget neutral and would modestly reduce overall budget deficits over 10 years.

3. The plan would lead to insurance costs for small businesses being 7%-10% lower than they would otherwise be by 2016. For the large group market (about 80% of covered persons), costs would be 0%-3% lower than they would otherwise be by 2016.

To put this in context, if annual health costs are projected to increase 7%-8% per year (somewhere in the middle of most projections), they would increase by 5.1%-6.7% per year for small businesses and 6.5%-8.0% per year for the large group market. In other words, there would be a modest slowing of growth in health expenditures, mainly for the small business market. However, all those figures would still exceed projected nominal economic growth. Furthermore, estimates for senior citizens were not made.

I admit, I was surprised and impressed that they got a CBO score for their proposals.

 

[RightinNYC]

Two most important parts, from my perspective:

According to CBO and JCT’s assessment, enacting the amendment would result in a net reduction in federal budget deficits of $68 billion over the 2010–2019 period. That estimate reflects a projected net cost of $8 billion over 10 years for the provisions directly related to insurance coverage; that net cost reflects a gross cost of $61 billion that is partly offset by about $52 billion in additional revenues associated with the coverage provisions. Over the same period, the other provisions of the amendment would reduce direct spending by $49 billion and increase tax revenues by $27 billion.

Limits on costs related to medical malpractice (“tort reform”), including capping noneconomic and punitive damages and making changes in the allocation of liability. CBO expects that those limits would reduce health care costs directly—by reducing premiums for medical liability insurance and associated costs—and indirectly by slightly reducing the utilization of health care services. Over the 2010–2019 period, those changes would reduce spending on mandatory programs by about $41 billion and would increase revenues by $13 billion as an indirect effect of reducing the costs of private health insurance plans (which would result in a shift of some workers’ compensation from nontaxable health insurance benefits to taxable wages).

My takeaway:

*The gross cost of this bill is $61b as compared to $1,055b for the Dems House bill. This bill would cover an additional 3m people over the 10 year period while that bill would cover 36m. That works out to $20,333/person for the Rep bill and $29,305/person for the Dem bill.

*Tort reform is absolutely needed. We can save $54 billion dollars as well as bend the cost curve down simply by enacting these modest provisions.

 

[1 Easy Target]

The most important points to take away from all this are:

1. All of the provisions in the GOP bill have been nixed by the Democrats from their bills. Health Savings Accounts abolished, Tort reform MIA, portability nowhere to be found.

2. The Democrats insist that there are 47 million Americans without health care. This is obviously overinflated. Even Factcheck.org disagrees with The Democrats. (That's a first.) The ‘Real’ Uninsured | FactCheck.org

3. The GOP plan does not raise taxes or levy fines on anyone.

Seems to me that using the GOP plan as a starting point to address some of the obvious cost savings measures is a logical first step. Then make changes at a measured pace as the results of previous steps become known. I see no need to rush in and throw out the good with the bad just to replace it all with the terrible.

 

[hazlnut]

The Obamanistas will quickly denounce this as not being a 'real' plan because it doesn't address all the things -they- want addressed.

That is, it doesnt expand government like they want it to.

The fallacy is obvious:
It doesnt have to do everything the Dems want it to do in order to be a "real" plan.

You do realize you live in a Republic, don't you?

And you were paying attention a year ago when we had a national election?

The Democrats did run on a certain platform. They won.

The expansion of Government (not saying I agree) is relatively modest. You can choose to look at each individual policy initiative objectively and form opinions pro and con etc.

-- or --

You can memorize every moronic Hannity-Beck talking point and spew them fourth here, there, and everywhere, casting aside critical thinking, intellectual honesty, and your self-respect...

And if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.:2wave:

 

[Goobieman]

You do realize you live in a Republic, don't you?
And you were paying attention a year ago when we had a national election?
The Democrats did run on a certain platform. They won.

So? Whats that have to do with what I said?

How does that address the fact that the 'it doesnt do everything -we- want it to do, so its not a -real- plan' argument is a fallacy?

And, aside from that:
So did GWB in 2004. I do not recall you stepping aside and not taking exception to the things he wanted to do.

 

[jackalope]

Two most important parts, from my perspective:





My takeaway:

*The gross cost of this bill is $61b as compared to $1,055b for the Dems House bill. This bill would cover an additional 3m people over the 10 year period while that bill would cover 36m. That works out to $20,333/person for the Rep bill and $29,305/person for the Dem bill.

*Tort reform is absolutely needed. We can save $54 billion dollars as well as bend the cost curve down simply by enacting these modest provisions.

I think the bill and CBO score gave a boost to tort reform, and I think the rest of the bill is a big giant status quo. Yup, they'll cover 3m more people, population will grow by more than that, likely, so we'll be worse off in terms of uninsureds.

 

[Erod]

I think the bill and CBO score gave a boost to tort reform, and I think the rest of the bill is a big giant status quo. Yup, they'll cover 3m more people, population will grow by more than that, likely, so we'll be worse off in terms of uninsureds.

If the focus is placed on allowing the private sector to fix the economy, that will reduce the number of uninsureds by actually putting them to work.

Since when is insurance a right?

 

[jackalope]

If the focus is placed on allowing the private sector to fix the economy, that will reduce the number of uninsureds by actually putting them to work.

Since when is insurance a right?

How will that help? There were tens of millions uninsured before the recession started, and health care costs increasing at rates higher than inflation. Spending twice what other industrialized nations spend on health care, all the rest.


The status quo is not an option.

And, since we acknowledged it to be so when we signed the Declaration of Human Rights.

 

[donsutherland1]

IMO, the Republican bill should be seen as a small downpayment toward meaningful health reform, not the full reform package. The Republican leadership has acknowledged that it is an incremental step.

What is useful in the bill is that CBO found that select provisions e.g., tort reform, have a positive impact in slowing the growth in health care expenditures and, therefore, premiums.

Comprehensive health reform, at least in my view, would need to have three objectives:

1. Substantially reduce the incidence of uninsured persons
2. Be budget neutral
3. Reduce the excessive rate at which national health expenditures have been growing so that the nation's health system would become sustainable in the long-run e.g., its long-term financial imbalances would be resolved