Don Nickles: “What is the cost of this proposal? I have heard somebody say it is paid for. It is not, according to the scoring rules…”

“What is the cost of this proposal? I have heard somebody say it is paid for. It is not, according to the scoring rules we use in the Senate. The cost of it--and we got a copy of this from the Congressional Budget Office. The total budget authority over 10 years is $5.3 billion; estimated outlay is $5 billion, and a revenue decrease, because of the insurance tax credit, of $669 million. So it is a total cost of 7.6 billion over 10 years. Now let's look at a couple of other provisions in the bill. This bill says we will take the present program and expand it. We will give basically refundable tax credits for insurance. The present program says the Federal Government will pay 65 percent of it, two-thirds. This bill says we will replace that and have the Federal Government pay 75 percent. That is three-fourths, if you are not real quick in math. And there is no limit on the cost. So a person in high tech, as I heard my colleague say, could maybe have a very generous health care plan, maybe it costs $10,000 a year and the Federal Government will pay $7,500 because there is not a limit in the cost. Wow. This thing is just growing.”