The Senate Finance Committee will vote next Tuesday, Oct. 13, on the pending health reform bill. The announcement came one day after a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis projected that the bill would cost $829 billion and reduce federal deficits by a total of $81 billion over the 2010 to 2019 period, meeting President Obama’s main requirements. The bill would also expand coverage from 83 percent to 94 percent of nonelderly Americans over 10 years, CBO said.
“Our balanced approach to health reform has paid off yet again with the news today that the America’s Healthy Future Act remains fully paid for, begins to reduce the federal deficit within ten years and makes significant reductions in federal debt over the next several decades,” said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) in a statement released by his office yesterday. “Most importantly, it improves and expands healthcare coverage for tens of millions of American families.”
Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the panel's ranking Republican member, cautioned against “a celebration of the deficit effects" that "masks who pays the bills." The package includes "hundreds of billions of dollars in new taxes and fees,” Sen. Grassley said. “Most Americans with health insurance will see their premiums increase. That's according to CBO and JCT [the Joint Committee on Taxation], the nonpartisan experts. Premiums would increase as early as 2010, before most of the health reforms, including tax credits to help people pay for health insurance, take effect."
