Most Expensive Bill of the Week

The Bill: H.R. 676, Expanded & Improved Medicare For All Act
Annualized Cost: $1.157 trillion (first-year cost)
Congressman John Conyers (MI-14) has introduced H.R. 676 to expand health care coverage to all US residents and to move the U.S. to a single-payer health system. Under H.R. 676, Medicare would become the country’s only major insurance coverage provider. Patients would be allowed to choose which doctors and institutions to seek medical care from as long as those providers choose to participate in the program. The government would also create an electronic patient record system as well as a new board to ensure quality and access.
The bill would prohibit private for-profit insurance companies from selling health insurance plans that are deemed medically necessary. Medically necessary activities include doctor visits, surgeries, preventative and nutritional therapies, prescription drug purchases, and treatments associated with dental and vision care. However, private insurers would be allowed to sell plans for services like cosmetic surgery. Non-profit health plans — such as HMOs — would continue to be permitted to operate.
The program would be financed by increasing income taxes on the top 5% of earners and imposing new taxes on unearned income, stock and bond transactions, and by redirecting existing federal and state government health care funding. The Fund would effectively defund the current public health care programs of Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
Using the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid’s 2012 projections of national health care expenditures, NTUF updated Single Payer Now’s 2009 cost estimate for enacting H.R. 676. Total health spending is forecast to reach $2.82 trillion in 2012, with federal and state government’s spending $1.28 trillion (under current laws). Sponsors of H.R. 676 claim their program will achieve $387 billion in savings through administrative consolidation and bulk purchases of prescription drugs and medical equipment. The remaining amount of what would otherwise be private health care spending ($1.16 trillion), would become federal outlays under this single-payer program.
One member of the “Super Committee,” Congressman Xavier Bacerra (CA-31), has cosponsored the Expanded & Improved Medicare For All Act.
To learn more or discuss this bill visit WashingtonWatch.com.