Senate health care bill gives $250000 gift to the mega-rich

That’s only slightly fewer uninsured than a version passed by the House in May.

Further, Collins, Paul and Johnson, along with Senator Dean Heller, have all said they will oppose a procedural motion to allow McConnell to move forward and bring the bill up for a vote. NPR’s Scott Horsley joins us now.

The assessment by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) that an additional 15 million people would be uninsured by 2018 likely complicates McConnell’s goal of scheduling a vote on the bill before the July 4 recess that starts at the end of this week.

That’s a lot of people, obviously ― enough to drag the proportion of US residents without coverage down to 82 percent from 90 percent. “Working-age, able-bodied adults with no dependents for the first time became eligible for Medicaid if their income is below 138 percent of the poverty level”. This bill would shrink it.

“CBO says 22 million people lose insurance; Medicaid cuts hurt most vulnerable Americans; access to healthcare in rural areas threatened”, she added.

Additionally, they want to transfer responsibility for health insurance to the individual states, which can ill-afford the additional expense in many cases.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) unveiled the legislation that would reshape a big piece of the US health-care system on Thursday, June 22. How does this forecast affect the chances of the bill passing?

HORSLEY: Well, it doesn’t help.

Collins said that she planned to accept the White House’s invitation for an all-GOP senators meeting later Tuesday, but insisted that she’s not anywhere close to supporting the bill.

Meanwhile, an analysis of premiums under the Senate bill by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation found more bad news for Republicans. When Majority Leader Mitch McConnell finally released the bill last week, as drafted in secret by a committee of 11, I did not catch a single GOP senator issuing a positive statement in favor of the measure. With Collins out he’s down to one.

CBO said that under the bill, most insurance markets around the country would be stable before 2020. And if we don’t get it done, it’s just going to be something that we’re not going to like.

Several Senate Republicans have indicated they will support both the bill and the motion to put it up for a vote. Sen. It also says that if states don’t expand Medicaid in the future, then fewer people will go on Medicaid in those states that don’t expand in the future.

The revision to the bill that imposes a penalty for prolonged lapses in insurance coverage addresses the original bill’s provision to drop the Obamacare penalty on those who do not have insurance.

The budget scorekeepers also concluded that, for the individual insurance market, premium costs would go down under the Senate plan, but so would the amount of coverage provided.

However, the White House attempted to discredit the CBO by pointing to the agency’s 2010 analysis of Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

Some Republicans have expressed concerns with the way the bill slashes the expansion of Medicaid, America’s public health program for the poor and disabled. On Facebook last week, Lee wrote that the Senate bill “doesn’t even significantly reform American health care”, and said he’d settle for language letting states and individuals completely opt out of Obama’s law. Heller, like Collins, can see what the Senate bill would do to his state (which, unlike ME, did expand Medicaid and therefore has a lot more to lose). And that would force state governments to either scale back the program or make up the difference out of their own budgets. It means Republican leaders have dollars they can use to sweeten the bill for wavering members, without ending up in the red.

For example, a 64-year-old with an annual income of almost $57,000 would pay a premium of about $20,500 a year in 2026, triple the amount expected under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare).

Even those with employer-provided insurance could see big jumps in personal outlays, depending on where they live.