The Congressional Budget Office late Friday released some new figures pertaining to the health care reform bill that suggest Democrats were able to dodge creating a deficit by removing a section of the legislation that they will have to pass later.
The $940 billion health care bill excludes a provision that would prevent automatic, steep cuts in payments to doctors who treat Medicare patients. Such a provision would cost $208 billion over the next decade and if it were included in the Democratic health care plan, would end up increasing the deficit by $59 billion over ten years.
Democrats left the provision out of the health care bill in order to keep the plan from costing money instead of saving money. As currently written, the bill would save $138 billion over the first ten years, the CBO determined.
But Republicans argue this does not provide a true cost for the bill, since everyone knows the costly “doc fix” will have to be paid for somehow.
Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who is the top Republican on the House Budget Committee, sent a request to the CBO to provide the cost of the bill that includes the fix. Ryan asked the CBO to produce cost estimates for other scenarios as well, including one in which Congress fails to implement an excise tax on expensive insurance plans or create a special Medicare advisory panel aimed at cutting the programs costs. These scenarios would also produce a deficit, the CBO found.
