Reid’s health care bill CBO Scoring is good politics, but the legislation still stinks

Last night, the CBO released the scoring for Reid's health care bill.  Instantaneously, the news reports gushed over how Reid's bill would not only be deficit neutral, but would in fact reduce the deficit by nearly $130 billion in ten years.  Unfortunately, the good news is more the result of well-timed politics than actually creating good legislation.  

The real reason the news seems so positive regarding Reid's legislation is the direct result of Reid not making the legislation available to be criticized ahead of the CBO scoring.  The media, in its pliant attitude towards leftist policies are merely trumpeting the wonderful news for all to hear before anyone has a chance to tell you what policies are included in the bill.  Let me be the first to fill you in on how the CBO projected surplus gains on the legislation:

• The Doctor Fix is out; wink-wink!  You can read all about this scam in one of my more recent posts.  Without the Doctor Fix, a 23% cut in Medicare reimbursements, any of the health care legislation that has been proposed thus far would project surpluses.  I don't think a single rational human being would make the argument that cutting payments to doctors and hospitals is the best approach to tackling the deficit.  Pass the Doctor Fix separately and projected surpluses magically turn into deficits.

• If a program adds to state and local deficits, but not the federal deficits, does that really mean that the program is deficit neutral?  One of the biggest pieces of this legislation is a gigantic expansion of the Medicaid and S-Chip entitlement programs.  These won't add to the Federal Budget though, instead Uncle Sam has decided to create an Unfunded Mandate for the states so that Washington politicians can pretend that there are no budgetary effects.  How many states are going broke right now?

• What are costs of implementation and enforcing the mandates?  They don't keep score at the CBO.  Costs that are associated with enforcing mandates, such as increased oversight by the IRS, are not accounted for in CBO scoring.  If the CBO has to calculate this every time congress wanted to pass legislation, they'd never be able to find deficit neutral legislation.

• The CBO did not indicate whether the legislation actually bends the increasing costs to health care.  As I've pointed out before, this is the real issue.  I'm fine with balancing the budget.  It is a plus to legislation, but the cost crisis is in stemming the rate of health care cost increases year over year.  All the legislation being proposed by Democrats is akin to kicking Grandma to the curb and taking away the large sums of entitlement money currently allotted to a few (old people) and reallocating those entitlements to a larger number of people.  

It's a great way to buy votes, but it doesn't do anything to fix, reform, or improve health care.  I'm sick and tired of all the pretending that this legislation is anything more.

Side Note:

Backdoor single payer is also stronger in Reid's bill.  The new bill charge's only $750/year to those that refuse to purchase health care.  That's a mere $62.50/month.  I can't imagine why anyone would purchase health care insurance under this mandate, if the same legislation is going to bar insurance companies from refusing coverage based on preexisting conditions.  It creates a situation where no one will buy insurance until they need to use it, which will either make private insurance more expensive or put private companies out of business.

Another Side Note:

I was unable to determine from the report whether Reid's bill had the same revenue generating scheme as the Bacchus bill. The Bacchus bill collected 10 years of taxes to fund 7 years of costs.

Read the scoring here.

Update #1

MSNBC has the scoop on some more gimmicks in the Senate bill. The effective date for the legislation is one year later, 2014. Therefore, the effects of legislation that will occur for six of the ten years in the ten year window, will be spread out accross ten years. That's in part, how the senate bill comes in lower then the congressional bill. Also, tax start a year earlier, so we will collect taxes for 7 years to pay for 6 years of costs. Does that sound like it pays for itself?

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