Politics or Poppycock

The Congressional Budget Office’s scoring of the bill boosts its prospects.

Posted October 7, 2009

by Noam N. Levey

Senate Democrats pushing healthcare legislation received a boost from the Congressional Budget Office today as the much-watched nonpartisan agency estimated that a health bill being debated by the Senate Finance Committee would cost $829 billion over the next decade.

The budget experts also concluded that the bill, which is sponsored by finance chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.), would help reduce the overhaul federal deficit by $81 billion by 2019, as additional spending to expand coverage was offset by cuts and new revenues.

At the same time, the bill would expand the percentage of Americans with coverage from 83% to 94% over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The estimate sets the stage for the finance panel to vote on the proposal later this week or next week, a key step in the Democratic campaign to send President Obama a health overhaul by the end of the year.

Once the Finance Committee votes, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) will combine the panel’s legislation with a slightly different healthcare bill developed by the Senate Health Committee.Reid, who hopes to bring the combined bill to the Senate floor later this month, is laboring to craft a bill that can win the support of both liberal and conservative Democrats and overcome a planned Republican filibuster.

House Democratic leaders are also working to build consensus before bringing their version of a health-care overhaul to the floor of their chamber.

Today, House Democrats met behind closed doors to talk about ways to structure a new government insurance program. Thursday, the group is slated to discuss how to pay for the package.

Congressional Democrats are trying to keep the cost of their legislation, as calculated by the Congressional Budget Office, below $900 billion over the next decade, a benchmark set by President Obama in his speech last month to a joint session of Congress.

Though Democratic leaders plan to offset additional federal healthcare spending with other spending cuts as well as new revenues, many conservative Democrats have expressed concern about a bill that would commit more than $1 trillion over the next decade to expand coverage.

If current trends continue, the nation is projected to spend a total of more than $30 trillion healthcare by 2019.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated that Baucus’ original proposal would cost $774 billion over the next decade.

Baucus did that in large part by offering substantially less federal assistance to Americans who would be required to buy insurance than more liberal bills developed by House Democrats and by Baucus’ colleagues on the Senate health committee.

But under pressure from liberal Democrats and some Republicans, the committee has moved to expand aid for individuals and for small businesses to help them provide their workers with health benefits.

The committee also has slashed proposed penalties for those who did not comply with a new insurance mandate and limited limit how many people would be subject to a new excise tax on high-end — or so-called Cadillac — health plans.