House Republicans have been working with the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on parts of an ObamaCare replacement that they could include in a repeal bill this spring, lobbyists and aides told The Hill. They have been working with the CBO, Congress’s nonpartisan budget scorekeeper, on the details of tax credits, high-risk pool funding, and changes to Medicaid that could be included in a repeal bill that Republicans hope to pass by the end of March.
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Many recent press reports have centered around the notion that Republicans are stuck in the mud trying to get their repeal and replace promises moving. That line appeared to be reinforced over last weekend when President Trump said in an interview that the process could draw out into next year. He was likely referring to the fact that the whole process, that includes implementing the replacement, could take well past 2017. Instead, Trump was taken literally by the press looking to write stories about how the whole process was foundering. Speaker Paul Ryan quickly countered in his press briefing that Republicans will legislate a repeal and replace of Obamacare this year.
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A Republican proposal to change how Medicaid is financed could save the federal government up to $150 billion, according to a new report. Block-granting Medicaid—when states receive a set amount of federal money to put towards the program—would result in $150 billion less in federal Medicaid spending over five years, according to an analysis released Monday by Avalere Health. Shifting to per capita caps—when states receive a set amount of federal money per beneficiary—would save $110 billion over five years, according to the analysis.
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The orderly transition to a more stable and affordable health-care system is merely beginning. Too much significance is attributed to Republicans adding the word “repair” to their vocabulary, as if this represents a policy change. The insurance markets really do need repair, and doing nothing isn’t realistic amid ObamaCare’s downward spiral. Uncertainty is inevitably priced into premiums, and benefits and rates for 2018 started to be designed and set months ago. They’ll be approved by regulators in the spring, so Mr. Trump’s HHS picks, Tom Price and Seema Verma, need to move fast to bring more predictability to the markets.
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The Trump administration is considering major changes to Obamacare that may help convince insurers to remain in the law’s marketplaces while Congress drafts a replacement plan — but the proposals may also limit enrollment and increase costs for older Americans, according to documents obtained by POLITICO.
The administration is looking to alter rules around insurers charging older customers more, how much cost they can shift onto customers, and who’s allowed to sign up outside the standard enrollment window. They represent changes that the industry had previously asked the Obama administration to make.
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Two of the top Republicans in Congress on Monday said they are pushing ahead with the plan to begin repealing ObamaCare this spring, despite any confusion caused by President Trump saying the process could spill into next year.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-Texas) told reporters that he is working off of Speaker Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) timeline of moving repeal legislation by the end of March.
“That’s the timetable I’m working off of,” Brady said.
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Obamacare repeal and replace is going to turn into a huge tax cut. Those reading the tea leaves would do well to consult two sources as to how and why: the 2015 repeal bill, and the House GOP “Better Way” health care blueprint. Just as in the 2015 bill, which was vetoed by President Obama, Congress aims to repeal all of the 20 major new or higher taxes in Obamacare. It’s important that this repeal be effective at the beginning of 2017, both to get rid of negative Obamacare taxes as soon as possible and to lower the current law’s revenue baseline for tax reform.
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Trump administration officials have a lot of work ahead of them, but also a tremendous opportunity to make history. Returning the executive branch to its proper role under the Constitution will also spur Congress to enact reforms that make health care better, more affordable, and more secure.
Michael F. Cannon, Director of Health Policy at the Cato Institute, outlines 14 ways Trump-administration officials can restore the Constitution’s limits on executive power, provide relief to Americans suffering under Obamacare, and hasten repeal.
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Conservative Republicans, worried about growing voices within the party advising or accepting a slower pace for repealing the Affordable Care Act, are redoubling their push to speed the GOP’s long-desired goal.
President Donald Trump on Sunday became the latest top Republican to sound cautious notes about the party’s ability to rapidly repeal large swaths of the 2010 health law and enact its own vision. He told Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly that “maybe it’ll take until sometime into next year,” saying repeal and replacement was “statutorily” difficult to accomplish quickly.
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In his first post, Conover argued that drawing inferences from observational studies about whether covering the uninsured will save lives is a fool’s errand . Quasi-experimental studies hypothetically provide a better tool for figuring out whether insurance coverage reduces mortality risks. Unfortunately, the two studies we have available are very unreliable instruments for figuring this out.
That said, based on the two studies reviewed, Conover cannot rule out the possibility of “excess deaths” in the event some people lost coverage as a result of repeal-and-replace efforts. Ironically, because the lion’s share of coverage gains under Obamacare has been through Medicaid, the New York study arguably is the most appropriate one to use to determine the effects of repeal. However, it is less credible than the Massachusetts study in terms of how much confidence anyone should have in its results.
In short, beware of anyone who claims we will lose 1 life for every 435 newly uninsured. 1 life for every 830 people is more believable, but even that is exaggerated and is far more likely to apply to those gaining private coverage than those enrolling in Medicaid. Unfortunately, the current state of science does not provide a very solid basis for guessing how much this estimate is inflated.
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