Prescription Drug Costs
The Congressional Budget Office has just revealed that “federal spending” on Medicare Part D prescription drug benefits could be “about $500 billion more than CBO previously projected” largely due to the Inflation Reduction Act.
When President Biden and Vice President Harris claimed that the Inflation Reduction Act’s cap on out-of-pocket drug costs would benefit “American families” and hurt “Big Pharma,” Just Facts documented that the polar opposite was true because the cap:
- forces “taxpayers” to pay for “all drug spending above” the cap.
- “benefits big pharma and harms American families who pay for this giveaway.”
- “forces seniors who don’t use a lot of drugs to pick up the tab for those who do.”
The following facts from CBO’s new report show that Biden and Harris were wrong and Just Facts was correct, as the cap has led to:
- “large increases in spending on specialty drugs.”
- insurers “building higher profit margins and higher administrative costs into their plan bids.”
- drug companies reducing their “patient assistance programs” and thereby “increasing the volume of prescriptions financed by the government.”
