$1.1T: CMS Sets Record for Annual Spending by a Federal Agency

(CNSNews.com) - The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which runs the federal government’s major health-care programs as well as the Obamacare insurance exchange, spent $1,113,178,000,000 in fiscal 2013, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement for September, which was released last week.

That sets a record for the most money ever spent by a federal agency or department in a single year.

It also means CMS spent more in inflation-adjusted dollars than the entire federal government spent in 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson signed the legislation creating the Medicaid and Medicare programs.

In 1965, the entire federal government spent $118,228,000,000 in 1965 dollars, according to the Office of Management and Budget. That converts to $878,824,380,000 in 2013 dollars, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator.

In 2010, CMS became the first federal agency to spend more than a trillion dollars, when it spent $1,035,783,000,000. In 2011, CMS spent $1,095,406,000,000; in 2012, it spent $1,052,799,000,000; and, in 2013, it spent a record $1,113,178,000,000.

Via: CNS News
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Healthcare.gov Hearings … Final Testing Not Done Till Last Two Weeks In September.. Cannot Tell Congress How Many Users Have Accessed Site Due To Contract With CMS

11:35am – Henry Chow from CMS made decision to force citizens to register in order to see plan prices.

11:31am – Schakowsky accuses Republicans of “Congressional Malpractice”

11:18am – CGI Federal cannot provide information on how many users have accessed the website because their contract with CMS prohibits them.

11:10am – Ms Degette – “Privacy concerns about website are a specter, privacy doesn’t matter since no HIPA information is passed to the website”

11:03am – End-to-end testing (the complete website) did not occur till the last two weeks in September ….

11:01am – It appears that CMS has privacy agreements with contractors to not disclose portions of the process, data and source code?

11:00am – Ms Campbell: More problems have come up, working on fixes

10:54am – Mr Slavitt: We will take complete accountability for any and all failures of Healthcare.gov which result from our products.

10:53am – Ms Campbell: The failures of healthcare.gov are more than just CGI federal’s problem.  Multiple components failed.

10:51am – Website locked up and crashed after 2,000 users simultaneously connected to it to apply.

10:48am – Engel: Even if a program gets off to a rocky start it does not mean we have to jump to conclusions about it’s long-term success; compares ACA failures to early failures of Medicare Part-D expansion.

Via: Weasel Zippers

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