The Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 was signed by President Obama on March 30, 2010. The bill was passed in the Senate 56-43. It was passed in the House by a vote of 220-207. The bill was signed at Northern Virginia Community College. The bill was passed after several discussions around healthcare reform, of which it took quite a while for everyone to agree to a set of healthcare reform actions. Florida health insurance will change, just like health insurance in all the other states.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the net reduction in the federal deficit would be around $143 billion during the years of 2010 – 2019. This figure includes $19 billion reductions from education provisions and $124 billion from the revenue and health care provisions. Some experts have questioned these amounts and say they are unrealistic. These experts feel that this bill is going to increase the deficit by as much as $562 billion. One thing is clear, and that is that Florida health insurance will be changing over the next several years, whether the deficit will be reduced or increased.

There are two different titles in the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act; one addresses health care reform and the other addresses student loan reform. Florida Health Insurance will see these new items take place over the next few years. Some of the provisions are changes to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, including increasing tax credits to purchase insurance, offer more subsidies to lower income groups, requires doctors to be reimbursed at the full rate when treating Medicare patients, eliminating special deals giving to senators, increase Medicaid payment rates to primary care doctors, lowering the penalty for not buying insurance, closing the Medicare Part D donut hole, 50% discount on brand-name drugs for Medicare patients, and more.

Some of the provisions for the student loan reform package include increasing the Pell Grant scholarship award, easier for parents to get federal PLUS loans, increasing community college funding, several billion will be used to fund poor and minority schools, loans will be administered directly by the Department of Education, starting in 2014, new borrowers will be able to cap the amount they spend on monthly loan repayment to 10% of their discretionary income, and also after 2014, new borrowers will be forgiven of payments after 20 years when all loan payments are timely. If you need assistance in locating particular coverages at a pre-determined price, we can help save 50% on health insurance. » Read more: Florida Health Insurance – Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010