The President submits his budget Humana 2012-02-23

On Feb. 13, President Obama submitted his budget to Congress. As the Capitol Hill publication The Hill put it, the budget itself "is largely symbolic, as Congress almost always dismisses the White House budget in favor of its own spending plans. Still, such sweeping proposals are a good summary of a party's legislative priorities, and the budget is sure to play a major role on the campaign trail this year." Also, the House and Senate haven't agreed on a budget in years. Funding has been done through continuing resolutions. The President proposed no big entitlement overhauls, and would cut about $364 billion from Medicare and $52 billion from Medicaid over 10 years. Specific health care proposals include: Increase means testing for Medicare Parts B and D, so people with higher incomes pay more. Beginning in 2017, impose a Part B premium surcharge for new beneficiaries who purchase Medigap coverage with low cost-sharing requirements. Require drug manufacturers to provide the same rebates to low-income Medicare beneficiaries as are currently provided under Medicaid. Expand the health reform law's small business health coverage tax credit in several ways, including by making it available to employers with up to 50 full-time employees (up from 25 full-time employees under current law). Direct $860 million to the creation of a federal version of state health exchanges (for states that opt out of developing their own exchanges).  Move up the date when states are allowed to apply for waivers from some provisions of the health reform law (2014 instead of 2017). Strengthen the power of the Independent Payment Advisory Board (which, beginning in 2014, will recommend cuts to Medicare. The cuts will automatically go into effect unless Congress enacts alternative measures that achieve the same level of savings). Health care providers and Republicans immediately criticized the President's proposals. The Federation of American Hospitals, for example, called itself "extremely concerned" that the budget "proposes arbitrary cuts to already inadequate Medicare and Medicaid hospital funding." And Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., chairman of the House Budget Committee, said the budget failed to show how the administration would "lift the crushing burden of debt and tackle our nation's most pressing challenges." Later, he suggested the Republicans would offer a budget that renews its call for an overhaul of Medicare: "We feel we owe the country a solution, a plan, to lift the burden of debt to get us back to prosperity…."