GOP plan economically short-sighted, too

Your life is worth only $1,500, and so is mine.

The CBO scored the U.S. Senate's GOP health care bill this week. Its scoring showed the U.S. deficit would be reduced by $321 billion over the next 10 years.

The scoring also showed an additional 22 million people would lose health insurance coverage they currently have under the Affordable Care Act. Most of these people would lose coverage as soon as next year, and most would be older (age 64 and younger, pre-Medicare eligible) and lower income people. Most of these people would be the working poor.

By converting this deficit reduction to a per person annual charge, this means that each of us is only worth $1,500. In short, if we can't afford health insurance because we lose our coverage for some reason, the Republican plan is saying we aren't worth $1,500 to society.

The math is pretty simple. $ 321,000,000,000 in deficit savings / 22,000,000 new people without coverage / 10 years savings window. This converts to $1,500 per uninsured person per year.

My guess, the costs that would be incurred by taxpayer supported local free clinics should this law pass would greatly surpass this amount each year. In addition, in the parlance of economists, my guess is the marginal product of most of these people probably greatly exceeds the $1,500 a year deficit savings under this plan. This means society would lose more in lost productivity than they would gain in deficit savings.

The GOP plan is not only mean spirited, but economically short sighted as well.

Bruce Fogerty

Wheaton