http://bit.ly/cHXER1 - - - The second scenario is much, much more likely to come to fruition:
"But perhaps the biggest risk that could cause the budget impact to diverge from the CBO estimates comes from Congress. The estimates assume that the legislation plays out as written over the coming decade, which would mean reining in the growth of payments to doctors and hospitals and implementing a tax on high-cost health insurance plans. "Those two policies are responsible for bringing in the revenue and cost savings that allow the plan to expand coverage to 32 million more Americans yet, according to the projections, bring down the deficit. "But that falls apart if a future Congress finds the cuts or taxes too painful to handle and overturns them." That will fall apart faster than the Post suggests. This Congress is already debating a “doctor fix” that rescinds the reimbursement cuts to providers, even though the numbers they submitted to the CBO rely on those lower figures. The Post also fails to identify the larger risk with the so-called “Cadillac plan” tax, which is that insurance companies will simply stop offering those kinds of plans in the future. They will tailor their plans to avoid the tax, and as a result, the expected revenues from that tax will eventually dissipate — and probably much faster than anyone thinks. The CBO should have developed alternate cases for these potential outcomes, but in their defense, they’ve been asked to score a fantasy from the very beginning. The Post reminds us that there are plenty of reasons to take the CBO analysis with a Lot’s Wife-sized grain of salt, not the least of which is the fact that it depends on Congress to follow through on their pledges. This is the reason that incremental change makes a lot more sense. It eliminates the need to compound assumptions, and it’s more reversible when it fails. - - - I note parenthetically that nothing -- NOTHING -- has ever been as cheap or cheaper than a CBO estimate. In fact, most items have been in reality much more expensive than when guestimated by the CBO. This monstrous bill must be defeated. - Publius -- "It ought never to be forgotten, that a firm union of this country, under an efficient government, will probably be an increasing object of jealousy to more than one nation of Europe; and that enterprises to subvert it will sometimes originate in the intrigues of foreign powers, and will seldom fail to be patronized and abetted by some of them. Its preservation, therefore ought in no case that can be avoided, to be committed to the guardianship of any but those whose situation will uniformly beget an immediate interest in the faithful and vigilant performance of the trust." [Federalist Papers #59] _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/[email protected] ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
