CBO: Reauthorizing CHIP Will Save $6 Billion

You may recall the news from a few days ago that extending the Children’s Health Insurance Program would cost only $0.8 billion, which should make it very easy to pass. As it happens, that estimate only included seven years of funding, for reasons I couldn’t quite figure out. (It’s a five-year funding bill.) But no matter. CBO has now estimated its cost assuming that it’s reauthorized for a full ten years. Here it is:

The reason the cost goes down over time is that it’s based on the savings from kids leaving Obamacare in favor of CHIP. The more expensive Obamacare is, the bigger the relative savings from getting kids into CHIP. And since the Republican tax bill makes Obamacare more and more expensive over time, it makes CHIP more and more cost-effective over time. This is stupid, but that’s what Republicans did.

In the end, then, reauthorizing CHIP saves us $6 billion over ten years. Can we pass it now?

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate