ObamaCare’s Cost Explosion Leaves Trail of Waste

June 6, 2012

New CBO Report Shows Increasing Cost of ObamaCare’s Broken Promises

The Congressional Budget Office’s long-term budget outlook released yesterday offers the latest evidence of the Democrats’ broken promise that ObamaCare would reduce healthcare costs.
Another new report also shows that Obama’s HHS is betting taxpayer money on high-risk healthcare projects (Solyndra, anyone?) with little chance of recouping the funds.
Sadly this is just the latest evidence that ObamaCare is a big-spending disaster, but Democrats have shown that they will defend ObamaCare no matter what the cost.

The Congressional Budget Office’s long-term budget outlook released yesterday offers the latest evidence of the Democrats’ broken promise that ObamaCare would reduce healthcare costs:

CBO: HEALTHCARE COSTS ARE RISING AND RISING FASTER: “Specifically, if current laws remained in place, spending on the major federal health care programs alone would grow from more than 5 percent of GDP today to almost 10 percent in 2037 and would continue to increase thereafter.” (“The 2012 Long-Term Budget Outlook,” Congressional Budget Office, 6/5/2012)

PER-CAPITA HEALTHCARE SPENDING GROWING 1.6% FASTER THAN GDP:(Press Release, “Rising Costs Could Double Federal Health Care Spending and Push Debt to 200 Percent of GDP by 2037,” House Energy and Commerce Committee, 6/5/2012)

PROMISE BROKEN: VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: GOAL OF OBAMACARE IS “BENDING THE COST CURVE”: “But, look, I think, if I can lay out, Mr. President, what I think we all agree on, and then figure out whether as a way to deal with the deficit end of this — bending the cost curve, to use a phrase you and many others have used, Mr. President.” (“Remarks by The President In Discussion of the Deficit at Bipartisan Meeting on Health Care Reform,” The White House, 2/25/2010)

DRIVEN IN LARGE PART BY RISING HEALTHCARE COSTS, THE DEBT IS SET TO DOUBLE THE SIZE OF THE ECONOMY: (Erik Wasson, “CBO Warns of Grim Long-Term Debt Outlook,” The Hill, 6/5/2012)

“CBO WARNS OF GRIM LONG-TERM DEBT OUTLOOK”: (Erik Wasson, “CBO Warns of Grim Long-Term Debt Outlook,” The Hill, 6/5/2012)

RISING DEBT LEVELS COULD SPARK EUROPEAN-STYLE FISCAL CRISIS:“Many economists have warned that if debt held by the public approaches 100 percent of GDP it can bring on the kind of fiscal crisis being felt in European countries today, in which governments must suddenly slash spending and layoff workers in the face of rising interest rates caused by spooked investors.” (Erik Wasson, “CBO Warns of Grim Long-Term Debt Outlook,” The Hill, 6/5/2012)

DEBT SO LARGE, CBO CAN’T ESTIMATE ITS ECONOMIC EFFECTS: “When the government budget scorekeepers took into account the worst-case scenario impact of debt on the U.S. economy, its economic forecasting model, well, broke: ‘Under the assumptions leading to the most negative effect on GNP, debt would reach 250 percent of GDP by 2035. CBO’s model cannot reliably estimate GNP after debt reaches that amount, in the agency’s judgment…’”(James Pethokoukis, “CBO: Massive Rise in U.S. Debt Crashes Our Economic Forecasting Model in 2035,” The American, 6/5/2012)

Another new report also shows that Obama’s HHS is betting taxpayer money on high-risk healthcare projects (Solyndra, anyone?) with little chance of recouping the funds:

OBAMACARE HAS HHS PLAYING “VENTURE CAPITAL INVESTOR”: “Perhaps you thought that the Affordable Care Act is all about making insurance more affordable. Too bad no one told Americans that the law also turned the Health and Human Services Department into a giant venture capital investor for health care. This won’t turn out well. Awash in ObamaCare dollars, HHS has a growing investment portfolio that includes everything from new insurance companies to health-care start-ups to information technology.”(Editorial, “Fannie Med,” The Wall Street Journal, 6/4/2012)

BUT AS HHS IS DOLING OUT OBAMACARE CASH, THE INSPECTOR GENERAL CAN BARELY MONITOR THE AGENCY AS IS: “The HHS inspector general revealed this year that his team can barely monitor HHS because its staff is too busy chasing the criminals exploiting HHS’s incompetence. Experts disagree about how much is stolen from taxpayers through entitlement fraud—the Government Accountability Office puts it at $48 billion annually—but one sign of the problem is that Medicare allows doctors (or “doctors”) to register for billing privileges as ‘other.’” (Editorial, “Fannie Med,” The Wall Street Journal, 6/4/2012)

OBAMACARE IS FUNDING HIGH-RISK HEALTHCARE “CO-OPS”: “One particular ObamaCare boondoggle that needs fly-specking is the HHS decision to finance nonprofit insurance companies with up to $7.25 billion in ultra-low-cost loans. These co-ops were a consolation prize for liberals after Democratic opposition killed the government-run public option, and the co-ops are supposed to be managed by and for consumers.” (Editorial, “Fannie Med,” The Wall Street Journal, 6/4/2012)

HHS OFFICIALLY PREDICTS 35-40% OBAMACARE CO-OP LOAN DEFAULT RATE: “HHS officially estimates that the default rate on the loans will hit between 35% and 40%, which would be bad enough.” (Editorial, “Fannie Med,”The Wall Street Journal, 6/4/2012)

BUT WHITE HOUSE BUDGET ESTIMATES SHOW FAILURE RATE COULD BEUP TO 91% AND $3.1 BILLION DOWN THE DRAIN: “But White House budget documents show that HHS expects to lose $3.1 billion of the $3.4 billion appropriated so far—which implies a default rate of 91%. The lack of accountability to shareholders or capital markets may help explain this propensity for failure.” (Editorial, “Fannie Med,” The Wall Street Journal, 6/4/2012)

Sadly this is just the latest evidence that ObamaCare is a big-spending disaster, but Democrats have shown that they will defend ObamaCare no matter what the cost:

MEDICARE TRUSTEE: OBAMACARE TO ADD AT LEAST $340 BILLION TO THE DEFICIT: (Lori Montgomery, “Health-care Law Will Add $340 Billion to Deficit, New Study Finds,” The Washington Post, 4/9/2012)

OBAMACARE TO COST $1.76 TRILLION OVER THE NEXT 10 YEARS: (Phillip Klein, “CBO: ObamaCare to Cost $1.76 Trillion Over 10 Years,” The Washington Examiner, 3/13/2012)

PROMISE BROKEN: OBAMACARE WOULD REDUCE THE DEFICIT: PELOSI: “‘The bill is fiscally sound, will not add one dime to the deficit,’ Pelosi proclaimed.” (Chris Good, “Pelosi: Health Care Bill Reduces Deficit, Spends More Than Senate Bill,” The Atlantic, 10/29/2009)

MORE PELOSI: OBAMACARE WILL “CREATE 4 MILLION JOBS IN THE LIFE OF THE BILL AND DOING ALL OF THAT BY SAVING THE TAXPAYER $1.3 TRILLION DOLLARS.” (Speeches, Office of Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, 3/22/2010)

DEMS HAVE REPEATEDLY PROVED THEY WON’T REPEAL OR EVEN FIX OBAMACARE:

98% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING OBAMACARE: (Roll Call 14, Clerk of the U.S. House, 1/19/2011)

95% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING OBAMACARE SLUSH FUNDS: (Roll Call 264, Clerk of the U.S. House, 4/13/2011)

95% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING FUNDS FOR OBAMACARE STATE EXCHANGES: (Roll Call 285, Clerk of the U.S. House, 5/3/2011)

97% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING FUNDS FOR OBAMACARE HEALTH CENTERS: (Roll Call 290, Clerk of the U.S. House, 5/4/2011)

83% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTE AGAINST REPEALING FISCALLY DISASTROUS “CLASS” PROGRAM: (Roll Call 18, Clerk of the U.S. House, 2/1/2012)

90% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING IPAB: (Roll Call 126, Clerk of the U.S. House, 3/22/2012)

87% OF HOUSE DEMS VOTED AGAINST REPEALING OBAMACARE SLUSH FUNDS TO PREVENT STUDENT INTEREST RATE HIKES: (Roll Call 195, Clerk of the U.S. House, 4/27/2012)