Two Republican lawmakers are touting a new healthcare bill that they say not only repeals Obamacare, but has the added benefit of reducing the federal deficit.
Texas Rep. Bill Flores and Georgia Rep. Austin Scott, the architects of
the American Health Care Reform Act, outlined details of the legislation at a breakfast meeting,
the Independent Journal Review reports.
"At the end of the day, the deficit, the fiscal situation of the federal government should improve with our aspirations and vision of what health care reform looks like," Flores told the Review afterward.
"I think, you know, we haven't had a [Congressional Budget Office] score but my gut tells me as a person who spent over three decades in world of business that the deficit should improve."
Scott had previously declared the legislation, if it became law, wouldn't affect the deficit, but told the Review: "I said it’d have no impact [earlier] but it should actually go down because we're removing mandates."
The Obama administration had also claimed its Affordable Care Act would lower the deficit — a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
The Weekly Standard reported in October that analysis of Congressional Budget Office projections by the Senate Budget Committee found Obamacare will increase the deficit by more than $100 billion over the next decade.
The new initiative, drafted and unveiled by the Republican Study Committee, would increase private competition between insurance companies, allowing individuals to purchase insurance plans across state lines, IJ Review reports. Also, it would create an award for the first entity to successfully cure or develop an FDA-approved vaccine for Alzheimer's disease, the IJ Review reports.
According to
The Heartland Institute's blog, the bill aims to "level the playing field between those who receive insurance from an employer and those purchasing it in the individual market."
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