CBO Report Says Senate Health Care Bill Will Raise Premiums

This is definitely not good news for the Senate health care reform bill, which I still cannot find a working copy of (yes, that is weird):

"The report, prepared at the request of Sen. Evan Bayh, found that those obtaining insurance on their own or through the government-run exchanges could expect to pay 10 percent to 13 percent more for insurance in 2016 than they would under current law. In dollar terms, in 2016 an individual policy would cost $5,800 and a family policy would cost $15,200 if the Senate bill were enacted, according to the CBO, compared with $5,500 and $13,100 under the status quo."

I thought this bill was supposed to be lowering costs. The fact that insurance bought through government exchanges would cost more than private insurance certainly makes me skeptical of the package as a whole. With analyses like the above coming to the fore, I bet it's going to be even tougher for moderate Democrats in the Senate to support this legislation.

Stay tuned.