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Ways and Means committee approves GOP health bill without knowing its cost
McClatchy
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/congress/article137384213.html#storylink=cpy
After more than 17 hours of deliberations, the House Ways and Means Committee approved the Republican bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act early Thursday morning even though the Congressional Budget Office hasn’t determined what the legislation will cost or how many people it will cause to lose health coverage.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee is in the midst of a similar marathon session. They’re expected to approve the GOP bill on Thursday, setting the stage for the House Budget Committee to finalize the legislation next week.
Republicans hope to move the bill to a full House vote in the coming weeks, although its fate is unclear due to opposition to the measure from conservative lawmakers in the House Freedom Caucus.
[…] The Ways and Means Committee rejected every Democratic amendment to delay their markup until the Congressional Budget Office could provide a cost estimate.
Other Democratic efforts to insert more than a dozen consumer protections into the legislation were also rejected.
And despite concerns that the bill provides $600 billion in tax breaks that will disproportionately benefit upper-income individuals, the first amendment approved by the Ways and Means Committee on Wednesday provided a tax break for insurance companies that would cost taxpayers $400 billion over ten years, according to testimony from Thomas Barthold, staff director of the Joint Committee on Taxation.
The amendment lifts a $500,000 limit on the amount of insurance executive compensation that can be excluded from taxation.
[…] Although the Congressional Budget Office hasn’t scored the Republican plan, the Joint Committee on Taxation estimates that repealing the ACA’s taxes will cost roughly $600 billion through 2026 and nearly $700 billion through 2027.
More than half of the tax-cut benefits would flow to people earning more than $1 million a year. They would see average tax cuts of $57,570 a year in 2025, according to estimates by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center.