Medicare Blog

how much money taken from medicare for obamacare

by Prof. Rebeka Lubowitz Published 2 years ago Updated 1 year ago
image

How much has Obama taken from Medicare to fund Obamacare?

A report issued by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) finds that the amount of money President Obama has taken from Medicare to fund Obamacare totals $716 Billion: Senger, Alyene, Heritage.org, "Obamacare Robs Medicare of $716 Billion to Fund Itself".

What does Obamacare do to Medicare?

• ObamaCare also cuts $716 billion from Medicare and invests it back into Medicaid, Medicare, and the healthcare system, so a lot of the money is coming from cutting waste, not just in Medicare, but in the healthcare industry as a whole.

How will the cost of Obamacare be taxed?

• First, to help pay for the cost of Obamacare, businesses and families will pay an additional .9% tax on taxable income and 3.8% capital gains exceeding $200,000 / $250,000. • Fees for not purchasing insurance will help to cover some of the cost of the law.

How much will Medicare cuts cost doctors and hospitals?

Of the $716 billion in cuts, $415 billion come in the form of “updates to fee-for-service payment rates,” a euphemism for reducing Medicare’s payments to doctors and hospitals. But what happens when you reduce payments to doctors?

image

How did Obamacare affect Medicare?

The ACA made myriad changes to Medicare. Some changes improved the program's benefits. Others reduced Medicare payments to health care providers and private plans and extended the financial viability of the program. Still others provided incentives and created programs to encourage the system to provide better care.

How much does the Affordable Care Act cost taxpayers?

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, about 73 million taxpayers earning less than $200,000 will see their taxes rise as a result of various Obamacare provisions. The CBO originally estimated that Obamacare would cost $940 billion over ten years. That cost has now been increased to $1.683 trillion.

Where does the money for Obamacare come from?

More Federal Medicaid Funds Per State: Prior to expansion, the federal government paid on average 57 percent of coverage costs. Under the ACA, the federal government pays 100 percent of the coverage costs for those newly insured under Medicaid expansion.

How much does the Affordable Care Act cost the government per year?

Also prior to this year, ACA subsidies cost taxpayers about $50 billion a year. And yet they led to only about 2 million people gaining exchange-plan coverage. That's a small number in a nation of 330 million.

Who benefited from ObamaCare?

More than 20 million Americans gained health insurance under the ACA. Black Americans, children and small-business owners have especially benefited. Thirty-seven states have expanded Medicaid, deepening their pool of eligible residents to those who live at or below 138% of the federal poverty level.

What is wrong with the Affordable Care Act?

The Problem: Affordability The ACA set standards for “affordability,” but millions remain uninsured or underinsured due to high costs, even with subsidies potentially available. High deductibles and increases in consumer cost sharing have chipped away at the affordability of ACA-compliant plans.

Did Obamacare increase taxes?

An additional 0.9 percent Medicare tax on earnings and a 3.8 percent tax on net in-vestment income (NII) for individuals with incomes exceeding $200,000 and couples with incomes exceeding $250,000. The additional Medicare tax raised $10 billion and the NII tax raised $31 billion in 2019.

Is the Affordable Care Act successful?

The ACA was intended to expand options for health coverage, reform the insurance system, increase coverage for services (particularly preventive services), and provide a funding stream to improve quality of services. By any metric, it has been wildly successful. Has it improved coverage? Indisputably, yes.

Is Obamacare free?

If you're unemployed you may be able to get an affordable health insurance plan through the Marketplace, with savings based on your income and household size. You may also qualify for free or low-cost coverage through Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

How much was Medicare robbed to pay for Obamacare?

Was Medicare Robbed $700 Billion to Pay for Obamacare? When talking about his plans for Social Security and Medicare, Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-AR) stated that Congress should not be “talking about getting rid of Social Security and Medicare that was robbed $700 billion dollars to pay for Obamacare.”.

How much did the Affordable Care Act save?

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) enacted savings estimated at that time of $716 billion to the Medicare program over ten years ( now estimated at $800 billion), which was used to pay for some of the cost of the new law under pay-as-you-go budget scoring conventions.

How long will Medicare be solvent?

Partially as a result these changes, the Medicare Trust Fund is expected to be solvent through 2030, 13 years longer than projected before the 2010 law was passed.

Did Medicare reduce payroll taxes?

However, there was no reduction in the amount of money going towards paying for Medicare; rather, the law reduced the amount that Medicare spends. In fact, Medicare payroll tax revenues increased, increasing the amount that could be spent.

What is Obamacare?

Obamacare is another name for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama. Obamacare mandated that everyone maintain health insurance coverage, or else they would face a tax penalty. Many people associate Obamacare with the health insurance plans that are sold on the ACA exchange, ...

How many people will be covered by Medicare in 2021?

Medicare provides health insurance to nearly 63 million Americans in 2021. 1. Medicare is available to people who are at least 65 years old or younger Americans who have a qualifying disability, such as ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease) or End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD).

What is the ACA?

The ACA is a sweeping series of laws that regulate the US health insurance industry. Medicare is a federal health insurance program for people 65 and older, as well as certain younger people with disabilities or medical conditions. There are several different types of Medicare coverage.

How much is Medicare Part A 2021?

Medicare#N#Most people receive premium-free Medicare Part A. The standard premium for Part B is $148.50 per month in 2021.#N#There are other 2021 costs you may face with Medicare Part A and Part B, such as deductibles, coinsurance and copayments.

What is the difference between Medicare and Medicaid?

Medicare, which is a federally-funded health insurance program for adults over age 65 and some younger people with certain disabilities and medical conditions. Medicaid, which is a government health insurance program for people who have limited financial resources.

When did the ACA open?

The ACA health insurance exchange opened for business in January of 2014. This marketplace sold plans that qualified as satisfactory coverage according to the new law. While the ACA remains in place, the tax penalty for not having insurance (called the individual mandate) was repealed in 2019.

Does Medicare cover cosmetic procedures?

Medicare does not typically cover services such as cosmetic procedures, alternative therapies and long-term custodial care. Obamacare plans. Plans purchased through the ACA exchange will provide different benefits according to their coverage level.

How much money was robbed from Medicare to fund Obamacare?

Huckabee said, "$700 billion was robbed (from Medicare) to fund Obamacare.". It’s an old claim and an old figure. The law does reduce Medicare spending, but not in the way Huckabee suggests.

Why did private insurers run Medicare?

Under President George W. Bush, private insurers began to run a subset of Medicare plans with the idea that more competition produced lower costs. However, those plans grew to cost more than traditional Medicare, so the Affordable Care Act pared down the payments to private insurers.

Does Obamacare rob Medicare?

Obamacare doesn’t literally "rob" Medicare. But the Affordable Care Act does include provisions that reduce future increases in Medicare spending. In other words, the law slows down the rising costs of Medicare. It’s also important to note that the savings come at the expense of insurers and hospitals, not beneficiaries.

How much did Obama cut from Medicare?

A recent advertisement from the Romney-Ryan campaign claims that “Obama Cut $716 billion from Medicare… to pay for Obamacare.” It continues by claiming that “The Romney-Ryan plan protects Medicare benefits for today’s seniors and strengthens the plan for the next generation.”

How much will Ryan's budget be in 2022?

In addition, Chairman Ryan’s budget would retain the $88 billion in Medicare cuts from the “ sequester ” (from a 2% across-the-board provider reduction) and calls for some additional Medicare cuts. On a comparable basis, President Obama supports about $990 billion of past and future Medicare cuts through 2022.

Has Romney repealed the ACA?

Governor Romney has proposed repealing the ACA in its entirety, and to date has not proposed any changes to Medicare over the next decade other than by enacting medical malpractice reform. Chairman Ryan’s budget would repeal the coverage provisions of the ACA, but would keep most of the $716 billion in Medicare cuts.

Is Medicare a premium support system?

Governor Romney and Congressman Ryan support implementing a premium support system in Medicare for those currently below the age of 55 (when they reach eligibility), which could result in substantial long-term savings.

Did Obamacare cut Medicare?

It is true that the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”, or the ACA) cut Medicare spending to finance a new health program. The number that the Romney-Ryan ad cites is from a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report that estimates repealing the ACA would increase Medicare spending by $716 billion through 2022. This funding was used primarily ...

Will Medicare be kept under the ACA?

Although some lawmakers may not want to retain all of the Medicare reductions from the ACA, many of them stem from ideas with broad bipartisan support – particularly in the policy community – and should at least be kept on the table as we consider ways to slow the growth of Medicare.

Did Obama use Medicare savings?

President Obama supported using most of the $716 billion in Medicare savings to help pay for coverage expansion, and supports enacting further savings for deficit reduction. Congressman Ryan supports largely retaining those same Medicare savings, but repealing the coverage expansions and using the money – along with addition savings – for deficit reduction. Governor Romney believes those Medicare reductions, along with coverage expansions, should be reversed – and has not made any significant short-term Medicare proposals for deficit reduction.

What percentage of hospitals will be affected by Obamacare cuts?

The Obama administration's own Medicare actuary, Richard Foster, has explained that the Obamacare Medicare cuts could make unprofitable 15 percent of hospitals serving Medicare patients.

Why did Ryan cut Medicare?

The first is that Ryan’s Medicare cuts were solely used to extend the solvency of the Medicare trust fund, and not to fund new spending elsewhere. By contrast, Obamacare cut $716 billion from Medicare in order to fund $1.9 trillion in new health care spending, through the law’s expansion of Medicaid and its new subsidized exchanges.

Why would the amount of premiums support increase at the rate of inflation?

Because the amount of premiums support would increase at the rate of inflation, where as health-care costs have historically grown at a faster rate , critics have worried that these trends, if continued into the future, would expose seniors to higher health-care costs out-of-pocket.

Does Mitt Romney campaign on the Ryan budget?

The second point is that Mitt Romney is not campaigning on the Ryan budget. He’s campaigning on his own budget, which fully repeals Obamacare, and eliminates that law’s Medicare cuts. APOTHEFACT CONCLUSION: Romney’s budget doesn’t preserve Obamacare’s Medicare cuts. Simple as that. Defense #2.

Is Romney's Medicare plan worse than Obama's?

The Romney plan for Medicare is worse, because it would shift costs to seniors. A talking point that President Obama has repeated on the campaign trail is that the Romney Medicare plan would “shift costs to seniors.”. This is plainly dishonest, and the President knows better.

Did Paul Ryan's budget preserve Obamacare?

Paul Ryan’s GOP budget preserved Obamacare’s Medicare cuts. Yuval Levin calls this the “ Ryan did it too ” defense. It has the merits of being factually accurate, up to a point. As I discussed on Tuesday, it’s true that the House GOP budget preserved Obamacare’ s Medicare cuts.

Does Obamacare change Medicare?

It’s true that the Obamacare Medicare cuts don ’t make any changes to the Medicare insurance benefit, which means that the health-care services covered by the Medicare insurance plan are technically unchanged. But Obamacare’s Medicare cuts are bluntly structured, in ways that will harm seniors’ access to care.

image
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9