On the recordApril 14, 2015
I would just make two points. The first, as I mentioned earlier, one of the great untold success stories of the Affordable Care Act reforms, as well as other reforms in the health care system in recent years, is that we have dramatically reduced the cost of health care on a per capita basis. In other words, the increased costs per person of health care have been dramatically slowed down, according to the Congressional Budget Office, which has helped save Medicare and other health care programs over $1 trillion. That is the right way to do it, by realigning the incentives so we are rewarding value in our Medicare system, not volume, as opposed to the Republican voucher plan, which saves money by shifting the risk onto seniors. The other point--and we have talked about this over and over--it just ain't so that the Republican budget balances. Again, it requires the revenue from the Affordable Care Act, that amount of revenue, in order to balance, at the same time they say they are getting rid of it. Two days from now, they are going to add over $268 billion to the deficit by getting rid of the estate tax for estates over $10 million. That is not accounted for in their budget. It puts their budget out of balance. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
