House Edges Toward Health Care Reform Vote
That Would Extend Therapy Cap Exceptions Process
The political drama concerning the fate of health care reform legislation continues unabated as House Democratic leaders struggle to round up enough votes to pass two key measures. The plan is for the House to pass the Senate-passed health care bill (approved by the Senate on December 24), which would clear the bill to be signed into law by President Obama. At the same time, the House will pass a budget reconciliation bill that would change several provisions in the new law. Some of these changes would delay implementation of the tax on Cadillac health plans from 2013 to 2018, remove the special Nebraska and Florida Medicaid deals, raise the Medicare payroll tax on the wealthy, boost subsidies for lower-income people to purchase insurance and narrow the doughnut hole in the Medicare prescription drug program.
Once the House passes the reconciliation bill, the bill will be sent to the Senate. Under congressional rules, budget reconciliation bills are exempt from Senate filibusters, and they require only a simple majority for passage. That is the reason why congressional leaders decided to pursue this convoluted process – to avoid a promised Republican filibuster in the Senate.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has just released its cost estimate for the proposed House budget reconciliation (provisions have not yet been released publicly). CBO reports that the bill would cost $940 billion during the next 10 years, but it would reduce the federal deficit by $130 billion in the first 10 years, and $1.2 trillion in the second 10 years.
With this information now in hand, it is likely that House leaders will unveil details the reconciliation bill later today, and move toward a vote, which might occur on Sunday.
The immediate impact of the passage of the Senate health care bill would be to extend the therapy cap exceptions process through the end of December. The Senate health care bill did not address the physician fee schedule problem, so that issue must be dealt with in separate legislation.