Citizen Fact Sheet: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's New Health Care "Reform" Bill

• Still the same flawed bill.  Like HR 3200 this summer, the new bill is still a government takeover of health care.  Weighing in at 1,990 pages, the new House Democrat health reform bill (HR 3962) seeks to completely rewrite nearly one-sixth of the nation’s economy.  Health care costs will go up.  Taxes will go up.  The bill cuts seniors’ benefits.  It still leaves 18 million people uninsured (that’s bigger than the state of Florida).  And it will force at least 12 million workers out of their private health care plans—for starters.


• The $1.3 trillion-plus price tag is just the beginning.  The cost is $1.3 trillion—$260 billion more than HR 3200.  And unlike HR 3200, the latest CBO estimate doesn’t even include the $245 billion “doc fix” Democrats stripped out of the new bill to hide its true costs.


• Cuts Medicare for our seniors.  Cuts over $460 billion from Medicare, including hospitals, home health and hospice care.  Includes nearly $240 billion in cuts to the Medicare Advantage program, which is the first choice of poor, rural and minority seniors.
  • Over 1 million Texas seniors rely on Medicare Advantage.
  
  
  • Under the cuts, 660,000 Texas seniors will lose their Medicare Advantage plans.
  
  
  • According to Medicare actuaries, all Texas seniors will pay an additional 20 percent more for their Medicare prescription drug coverage in Part D.
  
  
• Forces scores of Texas hospitals to shut down.  Physician-owned hospitals in Texas provide crucial access to health care, including for thousands of uninsured residents in the Valley, in West Texas, inner cities and fast growing suburbs.  The Pelosi bill will force over 40 physician-owned hospitals in Texas to shut down immediately—killing nearly 15,000 health care jobs, billions in economic impact and millions in state and local property taxes.  Other physician-owned hospitals in Texas will eventually be forced to shut down under this bill.


• Raises Taxes on Small Business.
  • Surtax: Individuals, including small business owners (who pay their business taxes at the individual level) making $500,000 ($1 million joint) will be hit with a 5.4% surtax.  It’s not indexed for inflation, so like the AMT will capture more and more families and small businesses each year.  One-third of the surtax will hit small businesses, including over 62,000 small businesses in Texas.
  
  
  • Employer mandate still applies to small businesses.  Small employers with a payroll as low as $500,000 will be hit with a tax. (0 percent (<$500,000), 2 percent ($500,000-$585,000), 4 percent ($585,000-$670,000), and 6 percent ($670,000-$750,000)). This isn’t indexed for inflation either, so more captured each year.
  
  
  • Forces businesses - large and small - to cover part-time workers with a government approved plan, and mandates businesses pay 72.5% of the premium— an incentive for businesses to drop their private plans and force their workers into the government run plan.
  
  
• Raises taxes on the middle class.  Penalties on individuals and employers who don’t purchase government-approved health insurance are still in the bill.  Entirely new taxes include:
  • New Medical Device Tax. The Pelosi bill includes a new 2.5% excise tax on the sale of a medical device in the United States.  Some are calling this the “wheelchair” tax—it will cover everything from bandages to contact lenses to prosthetics.
  
  
  • New Taxes on Health Savings Accounts. The Pelosi bill eliminates the non-taxable reimbursements of over-the-counter medication from HSA’s, HRA’s, and FSA’s.
  
  
  • New Payroll Tax.  The Pelosi bill creates a new “voluntary” payroll tax to fund new long-term care program—requiring mandatory spending—creating another new entitlement.
  
  
• Allows taxpayer-funded abortion.  Reversing a decades-old, bipartisan policy prohibiting federally funded abortion, the bill will authorize government funding of abortion through the public option.  It also establishes an accounting gimmick to justify subsidizing private plans that cover abortion.


• Members of Congress exempt from “Public Option.” Even though the Pelosi plan dictates the word “shall” 3,425 times in mandates and other requirements, when it comes to members of Congress enrolling in the government option plan—it says “may.”


• Doctors’ Reimbursement Levels Are Up in the Air—Budget Gimmicks.
  • Removes the Medicare Doctor Fix.  To make the bill look less costly, the Pelosi bill simply removed the $247 billion Medicare reimbursement solution for doctors and introduced it separately. They have no money to pay for it and have admitted the money is coming out “of thin air.”  Added to the Pelosi plan, it ensures health care reform will add billions of dollars to the deficit in future years.
  
  
• No Real Medical Liability Reform, Instead Rewards Trial Lawyers.  The Pelosi bill includes no lawsuit reform - only a cosmetic new grant program to encourage states to implement alternative medical liability reforms.  But here’s the kicker: a state is not eligible for the incentive payments if it, like Texas, limits attorneys’ fees or imposes caps on damages—two key reforms necessary to reduce over $100 billion in defensive medicine costs each year in America.


• Illegal immigrants.  Now requires the Social Security Administration to help verify citizenship when applying for health care benefits, but allows White House to set rules and enforcement.  Would encourage identity fraud by requiring verification of citizenship but not requiring verification of identity.  Also allows illegal immigrants to purchase health insurance from the state "health insurance exchanges."