Fix Health Care Policy

12 Days of Obamacare Surprises: The Independent Payment Advisory Board

Not all surprises are good. When it comes to Obamacare, the original projections are turning into unfortunately different realities. For the next three days, Heritage is going to highlight one of the various changes in Obamacare projections (e.g., cost, enrollment, etc.) from when the law first passed until now.

Obamacare created the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), which consists of 15 unelected bureaucrats who are tasked with finding savings within Medicare to meet a new, fixed target for spending growth in the program. The board’s recommendations will be implemented unless Congress enacts an alternative proposal that amounts to the same level of savings.

In 2010, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that IPAB would result in Medicare savings of $15.5 billion from 2010–2019.

In 2012, the CBO projected that the IPAB would result in zero savings for the years 2015–2019.  According to the CBO, “…the IPAB mechanism will not affect Medicare spending during the 2011-2022 period.” Later, in a letter regarding the repeal of Obamacare, CBO estimated that the IPAB could save $3.1 billion over the 2013–2022 period, but cautioned “That estimate is extremely uncertain because it is not clear whether the mechanism for spending reductions under the IPAB authority will be triggered under current law over the next 10 years.”

Surprise: The IPAB is yet another Obamacare plan that not only sounds like a bad idea, it is a bad idea. The IPAB is like a fruit cake—and it’s time to regift.

12 Days of Obamacare Surprises:

9. Increased employer penalties…

8. More cuts to Medicare…

7. Loss of employer-sponsored insurance…

6. A 50/50 split on enrollment estimates…

5. More uninsured Americans…

4. Increased exchange subsidies…

3. Big tax increases…

2. The small business tax credit…

1. And the individual mandate.

Tags: cost control, Independent Payment Advisory Board, IPAB, Medicare, Obamacare surprise

IPAB Spells Gloom And Doom For Medicare

Tomorrow, the Energy and Commerce Committee will mark up legislation to repeal Obamacare’s Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). IPAB is a dangerous mechanism that puts the power to limit seniors’ treatment options and access to care in the hands of unelected bureaucrats, essentially ending Medicare as we know it.

Despite the enormity of IPAB’s power and its influence on Medicare beneficiaries, its members are not accountable to the American people, unlike Congress. IPAB will consist of 15 unelected bureaucrats who are tasked with finding savings within Medicare to meet a new, fixed target for spending growth in the program. IPAB members will be appointed by the President and approved by the Senate, and the board’s recommendations will be implemented by the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) unless Congress enacts an alternative proposal that amounts to the same level of savings.  (Read the rest on The Foundry…)

Tags: bureaucrats, cost control, Energy and Commerce Committee, IPAB, Medicare, rationing care

Not As Advertised

Now that health-care bills have passed in both the House and the Senate, Democrats just can’t seem to stop themselves from rhetorical excess. Just before Christmas, as the bill sponsored by Majority Leader Harry Reid was clearing its final hurdles in the Senate, Democrats took to the chamber floor and cable television shows to trumpet the “historic” nature of the legislation they were about to vote on — legislation that would, at long last, move toward their long-sought goals of “universality” and a government-guaranteed right to health care.

But is it so?

Yes, both the House and Senate would provide essentially free health insurance, through the Medicaid program, to many millions of low-income people. But, even so, enrollment in Medicaid is a far cry from getting good care when it’s needed. For starters, about 40 percent of the nation’s physicians don’t see Medicaid patients because the payment rates are too low, which also means certain hospitals have very low rates of Medicaid admissions. The truth is that current Medicaid enrollees already have trouble getting access to high-quality care when they need it because the network of providers willing and able to see them is constrained and over-burdened. The House and Senate bills would add 15 million or more people to this program’s rolls without any guarantee whatsoever that there will be doctors and hospitals that can see them.

Ironically, the very Democrats who most frequently tout “universality” as the goal are also the ones who ensure it will never actually come about by insisting that America’s lower-income families enroll in government-run insurance — with no other options.

(more…)

Tags: cost control, Lewin Group, Medicaid Expansion, Medicare, ObamaCare