Repealing Health Care Reform Would Cost $230 Billion

New Speaker of the House John Boehner intends to repeal last year's historic health care reform bill, new provisions of which just went into effect, and which he refers to as the nation's "biggest job killer." For Boehner, it's a way of proving the newly elected Congress's commitment to fiscal responsibility.

The Congressional Budget Office, however, reports (PDF) that a repeal of the historic Affordable Care Act, would actually add $230 billion to the federal deficit over the next 10 years.

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From Citizen Cohn:

The CBO also estimated how repeal would affect insurance premiums. And, once again, the effect is entirely predictable. Premiums for people buying coverage on their own would fall a bit, but only because people were getting less protective insurance and because many with pre-existing conditions would be locked out of the market altogether. And even though premiums would be lower, many people buying coverage on their own would still end up paying more for their policies, because they would not benefit from the enormous subsidies that the Affordable Care Act makes available.

Speaking of people locked out of the insurance market, the CBO ran the numbers on the uninsured. An additional 32 million people would be expected to go without health insurance, bringing the percentage of non-elderly adults without coverage to 17 percent, which is more or less what it is today.

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Boehner has, according to the Washington Post, "brushed off" the CBO's analysis.