Congressional budget analysts have given House leaders cost estimates for two competing versions of their plan to overhaul the health-care system … The report from the Congressional Budget Office, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Post, puts the cost of one plan at $859 billion over the next decade and the other at $905 billion. … The cheaper version would rely heavily on a more dramatic expansion of Medicaid, the government health plan for the poor that is funded partly by the states — meaning already-strapped governors would have to pick up more of the cost of reform.
As we detailed this morning, the Senate Finance Committee bill attained its sub $1 trillion CBO report by shoving 14 million Americans into Medicaid. Medicaid is a convenient method for hiding the true cost of Obamacare because state and local governments pick up part of the tab.
Worse, Medicaid pays doctors and hospitals 20-25 percent less than does the private sector and as a result Medicaid patients often have trouble finding willing providers. In a 2008 survey of the 51 Medicaid directors conducted for the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, 17 reported some or significant problems with access to primary care, and 36 reported some or significant problems with access to specialty care. Americans are in for a rude awakening when they realize Obama’s health care reform means they have to participate in a welfare program.
In June, President Obama told Senate Democrats, “As we move forward on health care reform, it is not sufficient for us simply to add more people to Medicare or Medicaid.”
This is precisely what first the Senate, and now the House, is turning Obamacare into.
