New analysis debunks misleading and false Repub claims about health reform

You have probably heard the argument voiced by some Repubs that the Congressional Budget Office estimates that Obamacare will reduce the budget deficit are false. Among other things, they maintain that:

• Health reform covers up long-term deficit increases by front-loading revenues and back-loading spending.
• The legislation uses revenues from Social Security and premiums from long-term care insurance to offset the cost of health reform
• Medicare savings are double-counted.
• Congress doesn’t allow Medicare savings to go into effect.
• The estimate for health reform should include the cost of fixing the sustainable growth rate (SGR) payment formula for physicians.
• Health reform doesn’t “bend the cost curve” because it extends health coverage to 32 million uninsured, which increases health care costs.
• The CBO cost estimate is misleading because it does not include discretionary spending that may be provided in future annual appropriation bills.

Every single one of these claims/charges are either misleading or entirely false. If you want to know the truth, click here for an independent analsyis of these claims by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3134