CBO estimates impact of high court decision on health law costs, coverage expansion

Jul 26 2012

The Congressional Budget Office projected the court's decision allowing states to opt out of the Medicaid expansion would decrease costs to the federal government, but result in three million fewer Americans gaining coverage.

The New York Times: Court's Ruling May Blunt Reach Of The Health Law
The Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday that the Supreme Court decision on President Obama's health care overhaul would probably lead to an increase in the number of uninsured and a modest reduction in the cost to the federal government when compared with estimates before the court ruling (Pear, 7/24).

The Wall Street Journal: Report Gauges Court's Effect On Health Law
Three million fewer Americans will gain health insurance as part of the health-care overhaul because the Supreme Court loosened the law's requirement that states expand Medicaid coverage, the Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday (Radnofsky, 7/24).

Los Angeles Times: Supreme Court Decision Scales Back Cost, Coverage Of Health Law
Fewer Americans will likely get health insurance over the next decade under President Obama's healthcare law as a result of the Supreme Court's decision to limit it, according to a new analysis of the landmark ruling. At the same time, the court's decision to allow states to opt out of a major expansion of the government Medicaid insurance program for the poor could also save taxpayers $84 billion by 2022, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates (Levey, 7/24).

The Associated Press: Budget Office: Obama's Health Law Reduces Deficit
President Barack Obama's health care overhaul will shrink rather than increase the nation's huge federal deficits over the next decade, Congress' nonpartisan budget scorekeepers said Tuesday, supporting Obama's contention in a major election-year dispute with Republicans. About 3 million fewer uninsured people will gain health coverage because of last month's Supreme Court ruling granting states more leeway, and that will cut the federal costs by $84 billion, the Congressional Budget Office said in the biggest changes from earlier estimates (Taylor and Alonso-Zaldivar, 7/24).

Kaiser Health News: Capsules: CBO Reports On Impact Of Medicaid Ruling, Health Law Repeal Effort
Federal spending under the health care law is likely to be $84 billion lower over the next 11 years than previously projected now that states can opt out of the law's Medicaid expansion, according to a Congressional Budget Office analysis released Tuesday (Appleby, 7/24).

Politico: Health Care Law Now Cheaper, Won't Cover As Many People
President Barack Obama's health care law just got cheaper -; to the tune of $84 billion over 11 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. That's because the Supreme Court's June ruling on the law allowed states to opt out of a costly Medicaid expansion, and in a new report released Tuesday, CBO anticipates that some of them will do just that. As a result, about 3 million more people will remain uninsured, Capitol Hill's official bean counters said (Allen and DoBias, 7/25).

The Washington Post: CBO: Court Ruling Cuts Cost Of Health-Care Law, But Leaves 3 Million More Uninsured
President Obama's signature health-care initiative will cost a bit less than expected as a result of last month's Supreme Court ruling, but the decision is also likely to leave millions more people without access to insurance, congressional budget analysts said Tuesday (Montgomery, 7/24).

Reuters: CBO Says Healthcare Ruling Could Save $84 Billion
Last month's Supreme Court ruling that upheld President Barack Obama's 2010 healthcare law could save the U.S. government some $84 billion over 11 years, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday. … The CBO also estimated that 3 million uninsured people who would have received Medicaid coverage under the law before the ruling now will remain with no insurance (Smith, 7/24).

The Fiscal Times:  CBO:  Supreme Court Decision Lowers Obamacare Costs
The Supreme Court's decision upholding the Affordable Care Act but giving states the right to opt out of the law's Medicaid expansion will save the federal government an additional $84 billion over the next decade, the Congressional Budget Office estimated Tuesday.  The report said the increased cost of subsidizing people sent to the state-based insurance exchanges because they can't get expanded Medicaid coverage will be more than offset by the decrease in federal subsidies that will no longer be sent to states that opt out of expanding Medicaid coverage (Goozner, 7/24).

National Journal:  CBO Score Of Health Care Law Delivers No Big Wins
The CBO offered a fresh analysis of the 10-year cost of the health care law on Tuesday in the wake of the Supreme Court's ruling that states could opt out of expanding Medicaid to low-income adult populations without losing all of their other federal Medicaid funds. The congressional analysts found that the health care law is $84 billion cheaper and that 4 million fewer Americans will get health insurance, as states opt not to expand their Medicaid programs. ... They also found House Republican's latest repeal bill would worsen the federal deficit by $109 billion over 10 years (McCarthy, 7/24).

CQ Healthbeat:  New CBO Numbers On Health Law Paint A Mainly Pleasing Picture For The White House
New independent congressional analyses of the health care law, released Tuesday, underscore the takeaway that the Obama administration fared far better in the Supreme Court's June 28 ruling than many, if not most, observers predicted it would.  The latest take from the Congressional Budget Office and Joint Committee on Taxation: The ruling leaves intact much of the law's unprecedented expansion of insurance coverage. And getting rid of the law would make deficit spending worse rather than improve the nation's fiscal outlook, according to the analysts (Reichard, 7/24).

Boston Globe: Health Care Law's Coverage, Cost Shrink After Ruling, CBO Says
The Congressional Budget Office on Tuesday reduced its coverage and cost estimates for the national health care law to reflect last month's Supreme Court ruling on the law. … Because the expansion is no longer mandatory, the CBO said, about 3 million fewer people than originally estimated will have health insurance by 2022. With fewer people receiving government-subsidized coverage, the net cost of the Affordable Care Act between 2012 and 2022 will be $84 billion less than anticipated, the CBO estimated. The cost reduction from $1.25 trillion to $1.17 trillion represents a 7-percent drop (Borchers, 7/24).

Market Watch: Health-Law Costs Dip, Repeal Adds Deficit: Studies
Adjustments to President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul as a result of the recent Supreme Court ruling upholding the landmark law will result in some cost savings, and a proposed repeal of the legislation would add to the deficit. Those are findings from the Congressional Budget Office, which released two reports Tuesday examining the consequences of the Supreme Court upholding what is officially known as the Affordable Care Act, as well as the costs of the House's July 11 measure to repeal what been called "Obamacare" (Britt, 7/24).

Roll Call: Deficit Complicates Health Care Repeal Goal
Congressional Republicans' goal of repealing the Affordable Care Act continues to run afoul of their efforts to reduce the deficit, at least according to the judgment of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The CBO said Tuesday that President Barack Obama's signature health care law will cut the deficit by $109 billion over the next decade and is $84 billion cheaper after a Supreme Court ruling in June gave states more flexibility to nix an expansion of Medicaid. The estimate cheered Democrats, who have sparred repeatedly with Republicans over whether the law cuts the deficit (Dennis, Newhauser, and Strong, 7/25).

Modern Healthcare: Dems Cite CBO Figures On Repeal Costs; GOP Lawmaker Zeroes In On Subsidies
Provider groups and lawmakers focused on different elements of the Congressional Budget Office's new projections about the 2010 healthcare law to underscore or advance their respective policy positions. Democrats emphasized one report from the CBO that concluded repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act-;which the House of Representatives approved in a July 11 vote-;would increase federal deficits by $109 billion between 2013 and 2022 (Zigmond, 7/24).

Marketplace:  Who Gets Medicaid And Who Doesn't?
The Congressional Budget Office has been crunching some numbers on the Affordable Healthcare Act. Today it said the recent Supreme Court ruling upholding the law, but changing its Medicaid requirements, will save the government around $84 billion over 11 years. It also noted that repealing the law would increase the deficit by more than $100 billion.  We're going to be hearing a lot about Medicaid over the coming months, so we thought it would be a good time to look at the program -- what it is, and who uses it (Gorenstein, 7/24).

In other news related to Medicaid -

Kaiser Health News: 13 States Cut Medicaid To Balance Budget
Thirteen states are moving to cut Medicaid by reducing benefits, paying health providers less or tightening eligibility, even as the federal government prepares to expand the insurance program for the poor to as many as 17 million more people (Galewitz and Fleming, 7/24).