This is a Cato Special Podcast. I'm Caleb Brown. The Baucus bill aimed at changing

how Americans get their health care has moved out of a committee, but the bill itself, the legislative language has yet to be written.

According to Michael Cannon, Director of Health Policy Studies at the Cato Institute,

the Baucus plan means higher taxes and stagnant health care quality. The free market says is not on the table as an option.

The fact that the Senate Finance Committee has reported the Baucus bill to the full Senate means nothing in terms of momentum because you did not

have a majority of the Senate Finance Committee saying, hey we like this bill, let's make it law.

What happened was a majority of the members, although a lot of them did not like this bill,

a majority figured, hey, our side will win, our perspective will win win we'll get to make the changes we want if we

widen the battlefield by taking it to the Senate floor the problems that have

confronted the Democrats all along have not been solved by the Baucus bill.

They haven't gained any additional momentum by reporting that bill to committee.

It just means that the fight has been put off until the Senate floor and that's when these issues are going to be hashed out

And it's by no means certain that we're going to get a bill and the bill itself as of now does not exist.

That's right.

The Senate Finance Committee actually doesn't mark up and vote on legislative language.

They have what they call a conceptual summary, which is just prose describing what they want the legislative

language to do.

And there's many a slip between the cup and the lip when it comes to changing that conceptual language into legislative

language.

For example, the powers that the Baucus bill will give to this new Medicare Commission to reduce Medicare spending and

rationed care. I think that's one of the key areas where it's the way the language is

worded is going to matter a lot.

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