Yes, The House Health Bill Costs More than $1.2 Trillion

In a recent series of posts, I noted that the coverage provisions in the House health bill would cost more than $1 trillion over the next ten years, notably higher than the $894 billion figure that was circulated when the bill was first released. In addition, I pointed out that the bill includes other spending increases that aren’t involved in expanding coverage; when you factor those in, I estimated that the real cost of the bill would be almost $1.3 trillion.

I am not alone in this conclusion. According to David Espo of the Associated Press:

The health care bill headed for a vote in the House this week costs $1.2 trillion or more over a decade, according to numerous Democratic officials and figures contained in an analysis by congressional budget experts, far higher than the $900 billion cited by President Barack Obama as a price tag for his reform plan.

While the Congressional Budget Office has put the cost of expanding coverage in the legislation at roughly $1 trillion, Democrats added billions more on higher spending for public health, a reinsurance program to hold down retiree health costs, payments for preventive services and more.

Many of the additions are designed to improve benefits or ease access to coverage in government programs. The officials who provided overall cost estimates did so on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to discuss them.

My own calculation came in at $1.27 trillion, which strikes me as “almost $1.3 trillion” rather than “$1.2 trillion or more”, but that’s nit-picking.

The key point is that there’s a consensus, at least behind the scenes, that the bill would cost more than $1.2 trillion over the next ten years.

Comments

[Chancer:]

I recently read some health insurance industry professionals predicting that only 2 million will sign up for the public option. Since the public option is the real point of the Obama and the Democrats, doesn't that mean this cost $650 million per person in the public option ($1.3 T/2 M). And that does not even include the cost to seniors in Medicare Advantage absorbing a cost (loss) of $500 billion.

Obama and the liberal Democrats may make a huge "profit" (oh, that dirty 5-letter word) to pay for other socialist programs.

If only 2 million sign up, it will be so embarrassing that they might have to go back and change the program to include free healthcare for 12 million illegals.

Nov 03 01:24 PM