Human Services News

From Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

This week the House Energy and Commerce Committee and the Senate Finance Committee voted on reconciliation legislation to reduce projected expenditures for programs under their jurisdiction. This legislation meets the requirements of this year’s budget resolution to achieve reductions in entitlement programs, including Medicaid.

The proposals that the two Committees have released to achieve these savings make clear, however, that they are employing sharply different approaches to meeting this requirement. The House Energy and Commerce Committee achieves savings in ways that are very likely to cause harm to the millions of low-income people who rely on Medicaid for health coverage. The Senate Finance Committee, in contrast, attempts to avoid making changes that are harmful to beneficiaries, in part by extracting significant savings from overpayments to Medicare managed care plans.

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