
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, February 8, 1994                   TAG: 9402080078
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

RULING EXPECTED TO RAISE HEALTH PLAN'S STATED COST

In a new blow to President Clinton's health plan, the Congressional Budget Office is likely to recommend that mandatory health insurance premiums be treated as a tax, a White House official said Monday.

Such a recommendation would dramatically inflate the stated federal costs and make passage of the Health Security Act even more difficult. The premiums - including those now paid by most insurers - would amount to $1 trillion or more between 1998 and the year 2000.

A White House official, who insisted on anonymity, said the CBO is expected to deliver that verdict when its director, Robert Reischauer, goes before the House Ways and Means Committee to testify on the Clinton plan today.

The White House has insisted that the mandatory premiums on employers and consumers should not be counted as part of the federal budget. It repeated that argument Monday in its fiscal 1995 budget.

But Republicans and some Democrats have argued that the requirement to pay for insurance amounts to taxation.

Clinton's plan suffered repeat setbacks last week when several major business group rejected his employer mandate.

by CNB