Internet Scofflaw

The CBO has scored the House Democrats’ health care bill and it’s a disaster. By 2019 the deficit would be widened $65 billion per year and the gap continues to grow each year, despite a massive tax hike. That’s assuming that the tax hike brings in as much revenue as projected, which it won’t.  Also, despite the cost, the plan does not achieve universal coverage; it reaches only two-thirds of the uninsured.

But there’s a curious fact about the House Democrats’ plan. The tax hike is effective in 2011, but the new spending is not effective until 2013. Why is that? I think it’s to make the short-term outlook better. Since they’ll run up $49 billion in new taxes before the spending kicks in, it will take until 2016 for the plan to start losing money. (Again, assuming the tax hike works as predicted.)

So tomorrow’s Democratic spin will be that the plan cuts the deficit. The qualifier “through 2015” will be mumbled when it’s said at all. The further qualifier “after which it’s a catastrophe” won’t even be hinted at.

(Via Dmarron, via Instapundit.)

UPDATE: Alternatively, they might just lie. From the office of George Miller, chairman of the House Education and Labor committee, comes this press release:

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released estimates this evening confirming for the first time that H.R. 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act, is deficit neutral over the 10-year budget window – and even produces a $6 billion surplus.

(Via the Corner.)

This is an outright lie. The CBO scoring (linked above) says it would generate a $239 billion deficit over ten years, not a $6 billion surplus. The longest window over which it would generate a surplus ($4 billion) is six years.

UPDATE: Miller’s number is based on the notion that $245 billion of the bill doesn’t count.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 20th, 2009 at 2:20 pm and is filed under Political. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.