Thursday, June 22, 2017

Quick thoughts before the bill hits the tape

The Senate iteration of the AHCA is due out in about 40 minutes. A couple of quick thoughts, brought into focus by David Anderson's "how to read the bill" cheat sheet:

1) Back-loaded per capita caps imposed on Medicaid can theoretically be repealed before they kick in. But if the bill's massive tax cuts are not similarly back-loaded (to improve the CBO score), new tax increases would have to be passed in concert with repeal.

2. The more Republicans fiddle around with and publicly fight over individual market subsidies and rules, the easier they'll likely find it to pass the massive cuts to Medicaid that are the bill's core feature.

3.I can't shake the feeling that McConnell has some trick up his sleeve to make the CBO score a positive shock that helps sweep the moderates into the yes column. A "positive shock" might be a forecast of,, say, a reduction of a mere 8 million in the number of people with insurance by 2026, which Republicans can explain away as a result of personal choices (no mandate coercion) or CBO error.

4. What could that shock be? A cap on the tax exclusion for employer-sponsored insurance? Hard to believe. A little coup within CBO? Don't know how that work. Something else? Nothing?

So much for idle speculation....

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