EDMOND — Well, they finally did it. They passed health care reform. Is that a good thing? It depends on whom you ask. Now that one of the most hotly debated pieces of legislation in history has passed, the real interesting part starts now as everyone sorts through what it says, what it means and what it will cost. As the old saying goes, “Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it.”

I’m not going to get into a debate on the merits of health care reform. That subject has been beaten to death and doesn’t need me adding to it. One of the goals of health care reform was to make health insurance available to more people and at the same time lower the cost. Does the legislation achieve this goal? As far as increasing access to health insurance, yes. But it does not achieve the goal regarding cost and not in the way promised. As a matter of fact, on cost it is quite the opposite.

Here is where the philosophy part comes in. If we as a society believe that health care is a benefit that should be provided to everyone, then so be it. Of course, that is what the debate is all about. Perhaps a majority believes that, but apparently it is a slim majority. I’m sure the real answer to this question will be resolved politically and socially over time. There is no real way to win the argument at this point. However, what is not debatable is that the financial impact is not as presented. That’s a nice way of saying, “They lied!”

On insurance access, we as a country will add about 30 million people to the rolls of those insured. Half of these will go on Medicaid, which is partially funded by the U.S. government and partially funded by states. The other half (and these halves are rough estimates), will be required by law to purchase insurance, whether they want to or not. So the access we are discussing comes in the form of government sponsored (therefore taxpayer sponsored) benefits and forced taxation (requiring someone to spend money simply by virtue of being a citizen). Of course, most of those people would buy insurance anyway, but no one knows for sure what that means yet.

On the cost side, the government and the mainstream media continually feed us a pack of lies. As citizens, if we allow it we will get what we deserve. Here are a few examples:

1) There is the lie that Congress will cut Medicare expenses by more than 20 percent. That has never happened and if they know how to do that, why haven’t they done it already? Instead, Congress votes to “fix” the cost cuts that are required each year. For a great example, look to the “Doctor Fix,” which required Congress to lower Medicare payments to doctors by 21 percent this year. Less than two weeks ago Congress voted not to lower the payments. What did they do to make up the shortfall? Nothing. And yet this required reduction in payments to doctors is counted toward the cost savings going forward. In other words, they made the cut and then added it back. Make sense? Of course not. Unfortunately, the doctors also are becoming victims with all the double accounting.

2) More than $50 billion in additional Social Security tax is being counted toward lowering the cost of health care. Got that? We charge more to fund a program that is wildly underfunded, and instead of counting the money toward Social Security, we claim it will be used to lower the cost of health care. So what happens to Social Security? Nothing. It stays just as underfunded as it was, even though the government is charging more in taxes in the name of the program.

3) The new law collects $72 billion to pay for long-term care. This money is not needed immediately, of course, so will the money be put into a fund to use later as the long-term care bills come in? No! Instead, the money is used immediately to lower the cost of providing health care to 30 million new people. Once again, money collected for one thing is used instead for lowering the cost of the bill. What happens to the long-term care liability? It grows as another unfunded liability.

4) How about we collect taxes for 10 years, pay benefits for six, and call it a success! This is what we are doing. This measure begins collecting new funds within six months but doesn’t pay a benefit for four years. When you measure all revenue collected from 2010-20 and all benefits paid from 2010-20 (but really 2014-20 because none were paid 2010-13), then the program, with the sham accounting noted in the points above, miraculously saves $138 billion!

Any business owner who presented these facts to a bank and asked for financing would either be laughed out of the bank or be charged with fraud if a loan was made in good faith.

Any taxpayer who presented these types of items to the IRS would be laughed out of tax court. Try claiming a deduction twice (like claiming a new Social Security tax will reduce our liability while also reducing the liability of our health care) and see what happens. That’ll be interest and a penalty, thank you very much.

And yet we continue to allow our Congress to present these numbers as good faith estimates. Why do we demand less of them than we do of each other? If we as citizens decide that we want health care reform, and we want this particular health care reform, then so be it. But let’s be honest about the numbers and stop kidding ourselves and everyone else. Thanks for reading.

NICK MASSEY is a financial adviser and owner of Householder Group Financial Advisors in Edmond. Massey can be reached at www.nickmassey.com. Securities offered through Securities Service Network Inc., member FINRA/SIPC.