Here's your deficit spending for you

To any and all out there thinking this President is spending us to hell, so to speak:

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Further successes of "Obamacare"

To all the haters and non-believers out there, read 'em and weep (with thanks and a hat tip to The Huffington Post):

CBO: Obamacare Will Cost Less Than Projected

WASHINGTON -- The Congressional Budget Office has released updated estimates on the Affordable Care Act's impact on both the budget and the health insurance industry. The findings show that the president's signature health care law is actually growing cheaper to implement, costing the government $5 billion less in 2014 than was previously projected. The law also is projected to cover more individuals than previously believed, owing, in part, to some broader workforce trends.

Some of the highlights:

Twelve million more non-elderly people will have health insurance in 2014 than if Obamacare had not become law. CBO's projections on this crucial measure of the law's success are higher than recent surveys from the Rand Corp., which estimated a 9.3 million reduction, and from Gallup, which shows a 3.5 million decline.

For all of 2014, the CBO expects 6 million people to be covered by private health insurance policies purchased through the exchanges, fewer than the 7.5 million enrollment figure touted by the White House. That's mainly because the CBO expects people to cycle in and out of different types of coverage over the year -- perhaps by taking a new job and the health benefits that come with it -- and because some enrollees won't pay their first month's premium or will let their policies lapse during the year.

Even with those gains, a good chunk of the country will still lack coverage. The number of uninsured in 2014 will be 42 million people, according to the CBO. It will fall to 36 million in 2015 and 30 million in 2016 and 2017.

Most of them will remain uninsured because they will have declined coverage, the CBO said. Forty-five percent of them will have access to private insurance through the exchanges or an employer, while 20 percent will be eligible for Medicaid but will not sign up. In addition, 30 percent will be undocumented immigrants, who aren't permitted to use the health insurance exchanges or enroll in Medicaid, and 5 percent will be legal residents eligible for Medicaid but living in states that refused to expand the program under the Affordable Care Act.

Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program will grow by 7 million more beneficiaries in 2014 than if Obamacare weren't law, the CBO said. The law calls for an expansion of Medicaid eligibility to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, or about $15,300 for a single person, but 24 states declined to broaden the program this year. The number of enrollees will jump next year but eventually level off. The CBO projects that 11 million more people will sign up for Medicaid in 2015, and 12 million to 13 million per year between 2016 and 2024. The CBO does not estimate how many more people would have signed up for the programs this year had their states chosen to participate in the expansion.

The cost of the health care law is falling, according to the CBO. Between 2015 and 2024, the price tag of Obamacare will be $1.383 trillion, $104 billion lower than prior estimates. This is because of a combination of factors, including a reduction of $165 billion in the gross costs of coverage (the government will spend less on exchange subsidies) and fewer people and businesses paying penalties for either not purchasing coverage or not providing it to their workers.

So, the long and short of it is, as Vice President Joe Biden said at the signing, rather famously, "It's a pretty big f*cking deal."

Oh, and the two of them and the Democratic Party were all right on this thing, all along.

Just sayin'.

Missouri's Senator Blunt in the news, bigtime -- just not in a good way

Yessiree, Missouri's own Senator Roy Blunt is getting sent up today, in the news, on the internets and at The Raw Story, Daily Kos and Crooks and Liars.  The people in that political party just keep saying more and more ignorant things:

GOP senator to Fox News: Providing access to health care just makes people lazy

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) on Sunday suggested that President Barack Obama’s health care law would make some people so lazy that they didn’t want to work at all.

Last week, Republicans used a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report that said 2.3 million less hours would be worked after the Affordable Care Act was implemented to claim that the law was destroying jobs.

A Washington Post fact check, however, pointed out that access to health care meant that people would no longer be forced to work if their only reason for working was to receive insurance benefits.

But on Sunday, Blunt stuck to the Republican talking point, saying that providing health care “can’t be a good idea” if it allowed people who were only working for health insurance benefits to leave the workforce.

“I think any law you pass that discourages people from working can’t be a good idea,” the Missouri Republican asserted. “Why would we wanna do that? Why would we think that’s a good thing? How does that allow people to prepare for the time when they don’t work?”

Seriously, it's difficult to believe he or anyone privately even thinks these things, let alone believes them but to then say them, outloud and then, not just aloud but on very public stages like network television,  It's stunning, yet it keeps happening, ala' Todd Akin.

Syria, War and What Our Government Should Be Doing (guest quote)

"While all eyes are on Syria and America’s response, the real economy in which most Americans live is sputtering. More than four years after the recession officially ended, 11.5 million Americans are unemployed, many of them for years. Nearly 7 million have given up looking for work. The share of the population working or seeking a job is nearly the lowest in thirty years. The unemployment rate among high-school dropouts is 11 percent; for blacks, 12.6 percent. And the median wage keeps dropping, adjusted for inflation.

A decent society would put people to work -- even if this required more government spending on roads, bridges, ports, pipes, parks and education. And we can afford it. Deficit hawks in both parties don’t want you to know this but the deficit as a proportion of the total economy is shrinking fast: It’s on track to be only 4 percent by the end of this month, when the fiscal year ends. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office predicts it will be only 3.4 percent in the fiscal year starting October 1. What does this mean? Consider that the average ratio of the deficit to the GDP over the past 30 years has been 3.3 percent. So the deficit is barely a problem at all. (We’re still projected to have large deficits starting 10 years from now because of all the aging boomers needing health care.) 

 A decent society would also lift the minimum wage and expand the Earned Income Tax Credit (a wage subsidy) so no family with a full-time worker has to live in poverty." -- Robert Reich, American political economist, professor, author, and political commentator.

 

A "decent society" would have leaders in government who would do the right thing for their country, their own political party be damned, so if/when the nation had the worst economy in 80 years, since the Great Depression, and also had collapsing infrastructure, literally, they'd pass a jobs/infrastructure/projects bill.

That's what a "decent society" would do.

 

Links:  Robert Reich

 

Robert Reich - Wikipedia

 

Robert Reich | Facebook

 

 

STILL think "Obamacare" isn't good for you and me? Good for the people?

If you're still stuck on "defund Obamacare", read up:

Health care costs rise at slowest rate in 50 years

WASHINGTON — Personal health care costs rose in the 12 months ending in May at the slowest rate in the last 50 years, as spending on hospital and nursing home services declined, the White House announced Monday.

Personal consumption spending rose 1.1%, Alan Krueger, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said. Hospital readmissions rates dropped from an average of 19% to 17.9% for Medicare patients since the passage of the 2010 health care law, Krueger said.

A series of recent government reports and industry analyses have shown a decrease in overall health care costs. In May, a Congressional Budget Office report showed a $618 billion drop in projected Medicare and Medicaid spending over the next decade. A recent study by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) showed that for Americans who receive health insurance through their employers, premiums rose 3% from 2011 to 2012, the lowest increase since 1996.

The law is not affecting job growth, Krueger said. Job growth in industries that have traditionally not provided health insurance for their employees, such as restaurants, was higher. Restaurant sales and employment have increased more than any other retail sales industry since the law was signed, at about 11% for employment and 17% in retail sales, and weekly hours also have grown about 3% since the law was signed.

"Data from across the economy — covering consumers, government and private employers — point to the same conclusion," Krueger said. "Health care cost growth has slowed."

It's working.  The Affordable Care Act--"Obamacare"--is working.

It's already working.

Is it enough?

Heck, no, but it's helping and it's helping us, the people who need it.

Get behind this thing or get left behind.

This whole thing is exactly like FDR, back in the 30's and the creation of and Democratic support for it while the Right Wing, the Republicans and some business people were against it.

Need more proof?  Here you go, another, separate article:

State health exchange rates vary, but lower than expected

US workers: overworked, undervalued

Click on chart for larger views:

The good news is, your boss loves you. Link: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/06/speedup-americans-working-harder-charts

US wealth inequality

Okay, to clarify, one last time--the following chart shows the amount of wealth going to the top 1% of the nation over the last 30 years (click on chart for bigger view):

If you're down here with the rest of us in the Middle and Lower classes--you know, the 99% of us--you got this long ago. This is how intrinsically unbalanced--and unfair--our American system truly is. Links: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/09/simple-look-income-inequality; http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/cbo-top-1-percent-almost-tripled-incomes-fueling-inequality/2011/10/25/gIQAzbMrIM_story.html; http://www.cbo.gov/publications/collections/collections.cfm?collect=13

Americans, on our own wealth

From "Mother Jones" magazine: "A Harvard business professor and a behavioral economist recently asked more than 5,000 Americans how they thought wealth is distributed in the United States. Most thought that it’s more balanced than it actually is. Asked to choose their ideal distribution of wealth, 92% picked one that was even more equitable." (Click on chart to see larger view).

Link to original post--all charts at "Mother Jones", based on the CBO report: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph

More on the rich getting richer

More from the Congressional Budget Office's latest report on income and wealth in the US between 1979 and 2007. As shown on this chart, most income groups have barely grown richer since 1979. But the top 1 percent has seen its income nearly quadruple. (Click on chart to see larger view):

That bears repeating: The top, wealthiest 1% of the nation has seen its income nearly quadruple. So while the middle- and lower-classes are losing their homes or not able to send their children to college or other, myriad unthinkables--like being "food insecure"--the wealthy can take more trips to the South of France or buy that fifth or sixth home, probably to avoid us, the "little people." If you think about this, too, you realize the worst data may have yet to come out, too, regarding the wealthy getting more rich since George W. Bush's and the Republican's tax cuts for the wealthy wouldn't have fully been taken into consideration, from 2007 to now. Feel sick yet?

Them what has, gets

News flash: Rich getting richer, poor getting poorer. As though they needed to tell us. The Congressional Budget Office just released a report on "Trends in the Distribution of Household Income Between 1979 and 2007". More of the same. The rich and uber-rich keep getting more and more of the nation's wealth. As though they need it. Statistics: CBO finds that, between 1979 and 2007, income grew by: 275 percent for the top 1 percent of households, 65 percent for the next 19 percent, Just under 40 percent for the next 60 percent, and 18 percent for the bottom 20 percent. In short, it sucks to be us.

Who ran up that debt the Right Wing doesn't want to pay, anyway?

US Federal debt increases by U.S Presidents: Reagan 186%; Bush I 54%; Clinton 41%; Bush II 72%; Obama 23%. Inconvenient truths, anyone? Source: Congressional Budget Office

This will have the news tongues wagging all weekend

CBO: Obama understates deficits by $2.3 trillion

WASHINGTON – A new assessment of President Barack Obama's budget released Friday says the White House underestimates future budget deficits by more than $2 trillion over the upcoming decade.

The estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that if Obama's February budget submission is enacted into law it would produce deficits totaling $9.5 trillion over 10 years — an average of almost $1 trillion a year.

Obama's budget saw deficits totaling $7.2 trillion over the same period.

Now, all that said, it is a matter of optimism and hope vs. pessimism and skepticism, it could be said:

The difference is chiefly because CBO has a less optimistic estimate of how much the government will collect in tax revenues, partly because the administration has rosier economic projections.

To repeat, maybe giving the $700 billion tax cut to the wealthiest people in the country (thanks, Republicans!) wasn't such a good idea.

Links:  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_obama_budget;_ylt=AicJc51GkdiPqK4zmYJAADZH2ocA;_ylu=X3oDMTMzOTluZzhkBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTEwMzE4L3VzX29iYW1hX2J1ZGdldARjY29kZQNtcF9lY184XzEwBGNwb3MDNgRwb3MDNgRzZWMDeW5fdG9wX3N0b3JpZXMEc2xrA2Nib29iYW1hdW5kZQ--

http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy&hl=en&site=&source=hp&q=tax+cuts+for+wealthy+700&aq=o&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=b26d2f4496b7882f

In case you missed it on Social Security

Just out today:

Social Security fund slides into permanent deficit


By Stephen Ohlemacher, Associated Press
Thu Jan 27, 11:18 am ET

WASHINGTON – Social Security's finances are getting worse as the economy struggles to recover and millions of baby boomers stand at the brink of retirement.
New congressional projections show Social Security running deficits every year until its trust funds are eventually drained in about 2037.
This year alone, Social Security is projected to collect $45 billion less in payroll taxes than it pays out in retirement, disability and survivor benefits, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. That figure swells to $130 billion when a new one-year cut in payroll taxes is included, though Congress has promised to repay any lost revenue from the tax cut.
The massive retirement program has been feeling the effects of a struggling economy for several years. The program first went into deficit last year — the first deficit since it was last overhauled in the 1980s. But CBO said last year that Social Security would post surpluses for a few more years before permanently slipping into deficits in 2016.

Something has to be done with this sucker.  Our representatives need to stop being such cowards and address it.

And we need to let them, too.

We've known for decades this needs solutions.  We've also known that the earlier we fix it, the easier, relatively, and smaller the fixes will be required.  Alternately, the longer we wait and do nothing, the bigger and more difficult the solutions will need to be.

Washington?  You listening?

Link to original post:  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110127/ap_on_re_us/us_social_security

More reasons we need this health care reform we got

Not only do we need what health care reform we got, bad as our system is--and by bad I mean absurdly, unnecessarily expensive--but now we find out from the Congressional Budget Office that if the Republicans were to repeal it, it would cost the country at least $230 billion dollars.  From their report (note:  HR2 is the Republican's bill to repeal the Health Care Reform Act of 2010):

"Consequently, over the 2012-2021 period, the effect of H.R. 2 on federal deficits as a result of changes in direct spending and revenues is likely to be an increase in the vicinity of $230 billion, plus or minus the effects of technical and economic changes to CBO's and JCT's projections for that period..."

"Correspondingly, CBO estimates that enacting H.R. 2 would increase federal deficits in the decade after 2019 by an amount that is in a broad range around one-half percent of GDP, plus or minus the effects of technical and economic changes that CBO and JCT will include in the forthcoming estimate. For the decade beginning after 2021, the effect of H.R. 2 on federal deficits as a share of the economy would probably be somewhat larger."

That's one quarter of a trillion dollars the Republicans would add to our national deficit by repealing this health care reform we need and needed so badly, besides wasting their/our time by going back over it in Congress this year.

Idiots.

Idiots and demagogues.

Get on with the "people's business", people.

Links:  http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/cbo-gop-health-care-repeal-adds-230-billion-deficit
http://cboblog.cbo.gov/?p=1750

“A billion here and a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."

For all the focus on the historic federal rescue of the banking industry, it is the government’s decision to seize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in September 2008 that is likely to cost taxpayers the most money. So far the tab stands at $145.9 billion, and it grows with every foreclosure of a three-bedroom home with a two-car garage one hour from Phoenix. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that the final bill could reach $389 billion. --Binyamin Applebaum, The New York Times, "Cost of Seizing Fannie and Freddie Surges for Taxpayers" Link to original post: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/business/20foreclose.html?_r=1 Have a great weekend, y'all.