CBO: Medicare spending growth slower than expected

The Congressional Budget Office released new projections for the country's economic outlook Wednesday, forecasting that despite slower-than-anticipated spending growth, Medicare will account for an even larger share of the economy in the next decade.

Kaiser Health News: Capsules: CBO Says Medicare Spending Growth Slower Than Expected
Amid its grim projections for the economy overall, the Congressional Budget Office on Wednesday said that Medicare spending growth is slowing, although the program will take up a larger share of the economy in a decade than it does now (Barr, 8/22).

Politico: Forget The Cuts - Medicare Spending Is Still On The Rise
The report -; an update to CBO's budget and economic outlook -; found that Medicare spending will grow from 3.7 percent of the Gross Domestic Product next year to 4.3 percent in 2022. That's despite the health care law's $716 billion in Medicare savings over the next 10 years. Those savings are accomplished mainly by slowing the growth of payments to providers and Medicare Advantage plans, but Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan have been blasting the cuts as a "raid" on Medicare itself. Federal Medicaid spending, meanwhile, will increase from 1.7 percent of GDP in 2013 to 2.4 percent in 2022. Those projections factor in the Supreme Court decision that made the health care law's Medicaid expansion optional, CBO stated (Nather, 8/22).

Reuters: Medicare Spending Forecast Reduced In New CBO Analysis
Medicare, the popular healthcare program for the elderly that both political parties vow to rescue from financial ruin, will spend less money over the coming decade than previously expected, U.S. analysts said on Wednesday. In a report on the U.S. economy and budget, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office reduced its spending forecasts for Medicare by $19 billion for 2012 and by $169 billion over the coming decade from earlier this year (Morgan, 8/22).

Modern Healthcare: CBO Cuts Healthcare Spending Projections
A $160 billion net decrease from earlier projected federal healthcare spending estimates helped slow somewhat the federal government's expected accumulation of debt over the coming decade, according to Congress' budget scorekeeper. The decrease comes despite projections that spending on Medicare and Medicaid providers will increase over the coming decade by $163 billion more than was previously expected, according to a revised outlook from the Congressional Budget Office (Daly, 8/22).