Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada supports the bill, S. 1776, but Republicans and even some Democrats, such as Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, oppose it, and Pres. Obama has vowed he would “not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits.”
Under the federal formula, physicians’ Medicare reimbursements are supposed to be reduced whenever Medicare spending for physicians’ services exceeds a “sustainable growth rate” that is linked to the nation’s economic growth that year.
But every year — so far, without fail — Congress has temporarily set aside the SGR formula, and if Congress plans to continue with this approach, permanently eliminating the SGR would only raise Medicare spending levels on paper and not affect actual spending.
Even the Senate Finance Committee’s health reform bill, however, simply puts another one-year patch on the problem without permanently fixing it.
Read the New York Times‘ report on the sustainable growth rate.
