More On The Health Care “Ponzi Scheme” Rep. Earl Pomeroy Voted For
The other day I posted about Senator Kent Conrad calling a part of the House health care bill his North Dakota colleague Rep. Earl Pomeroy voted for a “ponzi scheme Bernie Madoff would be proud of.”
Today the Washington Times has more on said scheme:
The Community Living Services and Support (CLASS) Act is designed to help those who need assistance with basic daily tasks pay for in-home assistance. But moderate Democrats and Republicans worry about the plan’s impact on the deficit and the potential for saddling the federal government with the responsibility of another insurance program.
Sen. Kent Conrad, North Dakota Democrat and chairman of the Budget Committee, has called the act a Ponzi scheme.
Under the proposal in the House-passed version of the overhaul, the CLASS Act fund would collect monthly premiums, estimated to be $65 in 2011, from the wages of all working Americans, unless they elect to opt out - a technique used to help drive participation.
Once they pay premiums for five years, participants would be eligible for cash benefits to help them buy in-home care, if they can no longer care for themselves. Participants would qualify if they could no longer do two of life’s basic tasks on their own, such as eating, showering and dressing. ...
But budget hawks warn that cost estimates for the program by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), Congress’ nonpartisan budget-keeper, don’t look far enough into the future, when they expect benefit requests will far outweigh revenue. ...
“Nearly all the savings result from the fact that the initial payout of benefits wouldn’t begin until 2016, even though the program begins collecting premiums in 2011,” wrote the group, which includes Mr. Conrad and Democratic Sens. Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana, Evan Bayh of Indiana, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mark Warner of Virginia, as well as Connecticut independent Joe Lieberman.
Kudos to Senator Conrad who does, once in a blue moon, live up to the phony “deficit hawk” mantle he’s claimed for himself. But as far as Rep. Pomeroy is concerned, this just illustrates once a gain just how bad of a bill he betrayed North Dakotans to vote for.
