Fix Health Care Policy

Obamacare at Three Years: Increasing Cost Estimates

Newscom

Today marks three years since Obamacare was signed into law, and taxpayers probably aren’t celebrating.

Over the last three years, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has revised its cost estimates for Obamacare’s new entitlements—the Medicaid expansion and exchange subsidies—many times, and they have more than doubled since 2010.

The first estimate in 2010 pegged the gross cost at $898 billion from 2010 to 2019. But this projection was deceptive, because it included only six years of spending on these provisions, since they don’t begin until 2014.

However, CBO’s latest estimate in February 2013 provides a more accurate cost projection, finally encompassing 10 years of full spending. The 11-year estimate places spending on these provisions at $1.85 trillion from 2013 to 2023.

Read the rest on The Foundry…

Tags: CBO, cost estimates, exchange subsidies, higher than projected, Medicaid Expansion, ObamaCare, three years

12 Days of Obamacare Surprises: A 50/50 Split on Enrollment Estimates

Not all surprises are good. When it comes to Obamacare, the original projections are turning into unfortunately different realities. For the next seven 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 expands Medicaid eligibility to able-bodied, childless adults earning up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL).

In the March 2012 baseline, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that by 2022, Obamacare would enroll 17 million additional Americans into Medicaid.

In a July 2012 update, the CBO incorporated the Supreme Court decision that made Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion optional for states. Now that states have a choice in the matter, the CBO decreased its Medicaid enrollment projection by 6 million people in 2022.

Surprise: Without explaining their methodology, the CBO projected that exactly half of those no longer projected to be on Medicaid would become uninsured and that the other half would enroll in the exchanges. CBO’s rationale is about as clear as eggnog.

12 Days of Obamacare Surprises:

5. More uninsured Americans…

4. Increased exchange subsidies…

3. Big tax increases…

2. The small business tax credit…

1. And the individual mandate.

Tags: exchange subsidies, Individual Mandate, Medicaid eligibility, ObamaCare, small business tax credit, surprises