CBO Markups

[GMDino]

(09-18-2017, 01:42 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: So, this has been something in the news as of late with the ACA legislation being bounced around, and often ends up in the media when one or the other party dislikes what the other is doing and demands a CBO estimate before voting. It has become quite the political football.

Let's take a moment to discuss the CBO before jumping into this:

1. The CBO is a non-partisan agency that reports directly to Congress.
2. The current head of the agency, Keith Hall, is a conservative Republican.
3. Policy analysis of any sort is based upon forecasting, which is an educated guess. That being said, the CBO had a pretty good track record with their educated guesses.
4. The most in the news estimate they screwed the pooch on was the ACA itself, though that was a result of the judiciary saying the states could not be forced to expand Medicaid, and so conservative states not doing so.
   

How do you feel about insuring that legislation receives a cost estimate from the CBO before proceeding to examine the impact on the deficit?

What can it hurt?  Better to have an estimated guess that is more right than wrong usually than just a guess from the politicians backing the bills/laws/programs.