Quote:
Originally posted by Sidd Finch
NYTimes reports that new estimates of the cost of Bush's prescription drug plan are $720 billion over 10 years. Just slightly higher than the $400 billion the White House "predicted" (remember, back when they were suppressing any estimates of higher costs).
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Yes, but (as reported on NPR this a.m.) -- this discrepancy wasn't really caused by changes in any of the yearly cost estimates.
The original ten year projection of $400 billion when the bill was being considered covered 2004-2013. The trick there was that
the plan had no prescription drug benefit in 2004 and 2005 , just that little drug discount card that was estimated to cost about $5 billion for the two years combined.
At this point, two years later, the new 10 year projection covers 2006-2015, and 2014 and 2015 are _very expensive_ years (about $150 billion per). The projected cost of the program will continue to rise over time as the population continues to age, unless the benefit is changed or drug costs fall.
The Medicare folks knew this. Most people just didn't pay attention, though.
S_A_M
