It’s as previously reported.
The CBO report on the final health care language finds that the package—the Senate health care bill as amended by a reconciliation bill—would reduce the deficit more dramatically than the Senate health care bill on its own. And it will cover more people.
The bill would reduce the deficit by $130 billion in the first ten years, and potentially by $1.2 trillion in the second ten years (though CBO always warns that projections into the second decade are extremely unpredictable).
CBO finds that the bill reduces annual growth in Medicare expenditures by 1.4 percentage points per year, extending Medicare’s solvency by at least 9 years.
And, in a small, but significant improvement over the Senate bill, the combined package will expand health insurance coverage to 32 million Americans, as opposed to the Senate bill’s 31 million.
One key graph: “CBO anticipates that the reconciliation proposal would probably continue to reduce budget deficits relative to those under current law in subsequent decades, assuming that all of its provisions would continue to be fully implemented.”
You can read the entire report here.
Brian Beutler
Brian Beutler is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight, and the debt limit fight. He can be reached at brian@talkingpointsmemo.com.
Facebook Conversations
Questions about commenting with non-Facebook accounts like Yahoo, or other concerns? Click here to read the TPM Commenting FAQ.