The time has come to…

This past week the Senate Finance Committee has completed debate on the health care reform proposal. So it is time for the Committee to vote (amen to that!). The vote will take place next week and the Committee is the last of the five panels to consider the health care legislation before it is presented to Congress (and where the real action begins). The proposed plan will cost $829 billion over the next 10 years allowing for several reforms in the health care system including:

§ Creating a health plan exchange in an effort to standardize premiums and coverage
forcing insurance companies to compete for business.
§ Would increase coverage from 83% to 94% of Americans
§ Will reduce $81 billion of federal deficits
§ Medicaid would be standardized for everyone with an income up to 133 percent of the
federal poverty level.

For these reasons, and especially since it is below a trillion dollars, it is a bill that is being seriously considered. One missing piece of this bill is, of course, the much debated public option. Therefore there has been much speculation about the effectiveness of the competitive market in the health care sector with the absence of a government offered alternative. As a result, it may not even lower premiums and be helpful to consumers. With all these speculation the view of its effectiveness is slowing receding in the eyes of legislators. Yet nothing is set in stone until it gets to the congressional floor and amendments may be added or retracted but at the moment the time has come for the committee to decide.