Wait For Benefits Is 3 Years

1. The CBO's amiable scoring of the Baucus bill, accounting it at a cost of 829B with a deficit reduction of 81B, is based on TEN YEARS OF REVENUES AND ONLY SEVEN YEARS OF OUTLAYS.

2. But Baucus brooks far more bothersome bugaboos.

3. It "severely undermines the employer rationale for offering insurance" to his employees in the first place.

4. And when bosses bag on the bonuses budgeted by Baucus, "the foundation of the bill [will] pretty much collapse."

5. In other words, the debt will bloat obscenely.

6. Baucus imposes an injury of only $400 per worker on companies that cancel their coverage.

7. Ie, employers are exorbitantly incentivized to intermit insurance.

8. The overwhelming majority of employees, meanwhile, also come out way ahead when their coverages are cancelled.

9. Their out of pocket costs to provide for themselves are capped at 13% of income.

10. But their benefits are far more bounteous, and the bureaucracy under Baucus is obligated to bear the burden of the balance.

11. At both ends, the deficit is dealt deadly dents.

The Baucus health-care bill's negative repercussions - Oct. 9, 2009

12. CBO says Baucus is paid for, and it is.

13. But only by banking on bogus bookkeeping such as budgeting TEN YEARS OF REVENUES AND ONLY 7 YEARS OF EXPENSE.

14. And only at the cost of 404B in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, forcing individuals to insure themselves, fining those who don't, taxing small biz, pushing impossible mandates upon already bankrupt states, and placing painful impounds on payroll packages currently possessed mostly by unionists and residents of the dark blue Northeast.

15. It also leaves 50 million Americans out until 2013.

16. And even when implementation is complete in Year 3, according to CBO, some 25 million citizens will still stay uninsured.

17. This is how Baucus bankrolls his 829B bonanza.

18. Do you really think that Senators Lincoln, Conrad, Landrieu, Carper, Bayh, Nelson, Nelson, Dorgan, Pryor, Feingold and a dozen others don't know these things?

19. And do you really think they're going to place such punitive impairments on their people for the pure pleasure of their party and prez?

20. W-Stands-For-What's-His-Name used the exact same accounting intrique-ery to underwrite his Medicare prescription plan.

Sixty years is how long Democrats say they’ve been pushing for legislation that provides health care access for all Americans. They’ll have to wait another three if President Barack Obama gets a bill to sign this year.

Under the Democratic bills, federal tax credits to help make health insurance affordable for millions of low- and middle-income households won’t start flowing until 2013 — after the next presidential election. But Medicare cuts and a sizable chunk of the tax increases to pay for the overhaul kick in immediately.

The eat-your-vegetables-first approach is causing heartburn for some Democrats. Three years is a long time to wait for dessert, and opponents could capitalize on misgivings about the complex legislation to undo what would be a signature achievement for Obama.

“The real danger is that health reform could be vulnerable to what we see with the stimulus package,” said Democratic health policy consultant Peter Harbage, referring to criticism that Obama’s $787 billion economic plan hasn’t stemmed rising unemployment. “There needs to be more focus on what can you do quickly so that real people will start seeing change sooner, rather than later.”

Said Judy Feder, a senior health official in President Bill Clinton’s administration: “Just as we are fending off ideological attacks to get the bill passed, we will be fending them off as we implement the law.”

It took President George W. Bush’s administration two years to phase in the Medicare prescription benefit, a more modest undertaking.

“It’s very important to get the execution right,” White House budget director Peter Orszag told The Associated Press in a recent interview.
There’s another reason, less talked about: to make the costs of the plan seem more manageable under congressional budgeting rules.

Lawmakers use a 10-year accounting window to assess new programs. Starting the Medicare cuts and some of the taxes in the early years — and pushing the bulk of new spending into the latter years — helps keep the cost of the health care overhaul within Obama’s $900 billion limit. Bush used the same kind of maneuver to push the Medicare benefit through Congress.

“It means that the full cost of the program is underestimated in the 10-year window that you are looking at,” said Gail Wilensky, who ran Medicare for former President George H.W. Bush. “It’s not like we’ve never seen this before, but people need to understand what’s going on.”

Yet all of that has failed to make much of an impression on the Congressional Budget Office, the umpire of the costs and benefits of legislation. The CBO estimates that under the Senate Finance Committee bill, the number of uninsured will stay stuck around 50 million from 2010 through 2012, until federal tax credits start flowing the following year.

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From AP, via the Reno Gazette Journal.

Wait for benefits is 3 years if health care passes | rgj.com | Reno Gazette-Journal


The Prof

Wait! Didn't Pesident Obama say that the healthcare bill had to be passed to avoid a crises? He said 45,000 people each year die from lack of health care in the US! Thats 135,000 by his numbers who will have to put off dying for 3 years. If they don't make it, they pay for benefits they will never get? That is change.

If this doesnt convince people that this so-called "health care" bill is nothing but partisan political purposes to stay in power than nothing will.

chevydriver1123 said:

If this doesnt convince people that this so-called "health care" bill is nothing but partisan political purposes to stay in power than nothing will.

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If it was nothing but partisan political purposes, wouldn't they give the bennies before the 2012 election, and start charging the taxes after? :spin:

jackalope said:

If it was nothing but partisan political purposes, wouldn't they give the bennies before the 2012 election, and start charging the taxes after? :spin:

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if they did what you suggest, cbo would have scored baucus as a deficit death blow

hello

word is its real cost over 10 years of balanced accounting, 2013 to 2023, is 1.4T

The Prof said:

if they did what you suggest, cbo would have scored baucus as a deficit death blow

hello

word is its real cost over 10 years of balanced accounting, 2013 to 2023, is 1.4T

Click to expand...

That is an interesting accounting trick, I heard about it the other day. I really hate the Baucus bill, though.

i understand

almost all liberals, i say with respect, HATE the baucus bill

tomorrow's the big day

watch close

it looks as if senators like ms lincoln, mr nelson, mr conrad, etc---on the cmte---must choose between their seats and their president

really, if lincoln or nelson or conrad puts his or her imprimatur on half trillion dollar cuts to medicare, they WILL lose their seats

yet, if they don't, their prez is toast

very pinched positioning

also, hear this---either baucus will PASS tomorrow or the vote will be put off

very little chance a NO vote will go down

if it's put off, then health care is essentially dead, tho not quite yet officially so

on the other side, convicted liberals like rockefeller and wyden MIGHT kill baucus (or force a delay, same thing)

if they did so, it would be at the behest of ms pelosi

again, most true believers hate baucus as a sell out

they really want their public option

therefore, libs like rockefeller and wyden are forced to choose between their principles and their prez

political PHYSICS dictate clearly the former---red staters like lincoln, nelson and conrad will vote for their seats and sacrifice their prez

men like rockefeller and wyden will go with the party and the prez

but really no one can today say

just gonna have to wait

i'll tell you this---it is punditry's CONSENSUS that baucus will pass tomorrow

so i guess it must be so

(tho it sure doesn't look that way to me)

even if baucus does clear cmte, then mr reid must MERGE baucus and HELP

by all accounts an IMPOSSIBLE task

every time he takes out this or puts in that he OFFENDS about a third of his party

and then whatever comes out of the senate must be reconciled with pelosi's piece

it also VERY MUCH looks like hr3200 will never clear lower floor

it barely squeaked past waxman, an hour before recess, by a margin of, i think, two

and the bill has been moved miles left since then

bluedogs are furious

in the long run, it is evident---obamacare's obstacles appear insuperable

but that's looking too far down the road

tomorrow, baucus

enjoy watching, i sure will, either way

and perhaps we'll talk tomorrow nite

take care, friend

cliff

The Prof said:

i understand

almost all liberals, i say with respect, HATE the baucus bill

tomorrow's the big day

watch close

it looks as if senators like ms lincoln, mr nelson, mr conrad, etc---on the cmte---must choose between their seats and their president

really, if lincoln or nelson or conrad puts his or her imprimatur on half trillion dollar cuts to medicare, they WILL lose their seats

yet, if they don't, their prez is toast

very pinched positioning

also, hear this---either baucus will PASS tomorrow or the vote will be put off

very little chance a NO vote will go down

if it's put off, then health care is essentially dead, tho not quite yet officially so

on the other side, convicted liberals like rockefeller and wyden MIGHT kill baucus (or force a delay, same thing)

if they did so, it would be at the behest of ms pelosi

again, most true believers hate baucus as a sell out

they really want their public option

therefore, libs like rockefeller and wyden are forced to choose between their principles and their prez

political PHYSICS dictate clearly the former---red staters like lincoln, nelson and conrad will vote for their seats and sacrifice their prez

men like rockefeller and wyden will go with the party and the prez

but really no one can today say

just gonna have to wait

i'll tell you this---it is punditry's CONSENSUS that baucus will pass tomorrow

so i guess it must be so

(tho it sure doesn't look that way to me)

even if baucus does clear cmte, then mr reid must MERGE baucus and HELP

by all accounts an IMPOSSIBLE task

every time he takes out this or puts in that he OFFENDS about a third of his party

and then whatever comes out of the senate must be reconciled with pelosi's piece

it also VERY MUCH looks like hr3200 will never clear lower floor

it barely squeaked past waxman, an hour before recess, by a margin of, i think, two

and the bill has been moved miles left since then

bluedogs are furious

in the long run, it is evident---obamacare's obstacles appear insuperable

but that's looking too far down the road

tomorrow, baucus

enjoy watching, i sure will, either way

and perhaps we'll talk tomorrow nite

take care, friend

cliff

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I think Ms Lincoln will not vote for the bill. Nelson seems to be pushing Olympia's trigger thing. I don't think tomorrow is that important. Well it is b/c this beast needs to get out of committee, but I don't think whatever comes out of Baucus' committee will be the bill. The health industry shot themselves in the foot with their Price Waterhouse Cooper report. They basically razzed the country and said we're gonna put the shiv in, premiums are going up up up. It's a good push for public option, some variation of it. I wonder about the opt out thing I've been hearing about.

I am tired of waiting to see what will emerge.

Nite, Cliff