By Russ Britt, MarketWatch
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — 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.”
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The CBO determined that the court’s decision allowing states to bow out of planned federal Medicaid expansion would help cut costs by roughly $84 billion over the next decade. That brings down the overall price tag of the overhaul’s insurance provisions during that period, to $1.168 trillion from $1.252 trillion.
“The projected net savings to the federal government resulting from the Supreme Court’s decision arise because the reductions in spending from lower Medicaid enrollment are expected to more than offset the increase in costs from greater participation in the exchanges,” the report said.
The CBO also found that it now sees more indigent patients left uninsured without the Medicaid expansions, resulting in those savings.
Meanwhile, the report looking at H.R. 6079, the House resolution designed to repeal the health-care bill, determined that the savings from money that would be spent on the overhaul would be more than offset by the provisions that would add to federal coffers by roughly $109 billion over the next 10 years.
The net savings from repealing the bill would be $890 billion, but provisions in the bill designed to reduce health spending in other areas by $1 trillion would dissipate, according to the CBO report.
As for projections on how many will be left uninsured, the Congressional Budget Office says that roughly 30 million more people would be without coverage by 2022 without the health-care overhaul, due to the elimination of insurance exchanges and reductions in Medicaid and other public coverage.
Reuters
That takes into account roughly 7 million people who would purchase their own insurance or receive it from their employer instead.
In related news, another study from the consultant Deloitte has determined that nearly one in 10 employers plan to drop coverage for their workers once provisions of the act take effect. See the full Deloitte study.
The report finds that 9% of the companies representing 3% of the workforce will drop coverage and pay a penalty, or get their employees to seek subsidies for coverage instead. More than eight in 10 employers representing 84% of the workforce will retain coverage.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the Deloitte report differs from that of rival McKinsey & Co., which recently said nearly 30% of all companies would drop coverage. See story on the two studies on WSJ.com.
Russ Britt is the Los Angeles bureau chief for MarketWatch.
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