12 Nov Major Cuts in Provider Pay Recommended by White House Commission

HealthLeadersMedia.com | November 11 – Hospital leaders are objecting to draft recommendations issued Wednesday that would impose earlier and more draconian pay cuts to hospitals and doctors, and slice many programs that support hospital programs that serve the poor.

The report from the co-chairs of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, appointed by President Obama in February to deal with the nation’s fiscal crisis, suggests numerous strategies to save $200.3 billion in federal spending by 2015 and reduce the federal deficit by $4 trillion by 2020.

The proposals were submitted by co-chairs Sen. Alan Simpson, former Republican Senator from Wyoming, and Erskine Bowles, Chief of Staff to former President Clinton.

The panel’s recommended cuts are sprinkled through a wide variety of 58 federal programs, including paring defense and space program budgets, downsizing the federal workforce by 200,000, and cutting the budget for the White House and Congress. They would increase the maximum income tax as well as the tax on gasoline.

“America cannot be great if we go broke,” the commission said. “Our economy will not grow and our country will not be able to compete without a plan to get this crushing debt burden off our back.”

Read more on HealthLeadersMedia.com.