Congressional Democrats released a final version of the President Barack Obama's health care overhaul bill in advance of passage Sunday by the House. Some features of the legislation, which makes changes to the bill the Senate passed on Christmas Eve:
What You Can Expect

-- If you have employer-sponsored coverage: Any lifetime caps on how much your health plan will cover, often set between $1 million and $5 million, will be eliminated in both group and individual health plans starting later this year. Employers will have to disclose the cost of workers' health coverage on their W-2 tax forms starting in 2011.

-- If you have a small business: Small firms starting this year may be eligible for new tax credits that would cover up to 35% of health-insurance premiums for businesses that have fewer than 25 employees. Workers at small businesses eventually will be able to buy policies on new health-insurance exchanges, where health benefits will have to meet a new minimum standard.

-- If you're uninsured: Over the next 10 years, the bill will extend coverage to an estimated 32 million people who would otherwise lack coverage. It does this by expanding the government safety net and providing subsidies for low- and moderate-income people without employer health benefits to buy private plans on health-insurance exchanges, which are due to start in 2014. For the first time, all citizens and legal residents will have to buy health insurance--with financial aid from the government if they can't afford it, on a sliding scale up to 400% of the poverty line--or face a penalty starting in 2014, with some exceptions for low-income people. The amounts are set to rise annually, beginning with a fine of $95 or 1% of income, whichever is greater, and growing to as much as $695 or 2.5% of taxable income by 2016.

COST: $940 billion over 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

HOW MANY COVERED: 32 million uninsured. Major coverage expansion begins in 2014. When fully phased in, 95 percent of eligible Americans would have coverage, compared with 83 percent today.

INSURANCE MANDATE: Almost everyone is required to be insured or else pay a fine. There is an exemption for low-income people. Mandate takes effect in 2014.

INSURANCE MARKET REFORMS: Starting this year, insurers would be forbidden from placing lifetime dollar limits on policies, from denying coverage to children because of pre-existing conditions, and from canceling policies because someone gets sick. Parents would be able to keep older kids on their coverage up to age 26. A new high-risk pool would offer coverage to uninsured people with medical problems until 2014, when the coverage expansion goes into high gear. Major consumer safeguards would also take effect in 2014. Insurers would be prohibited from denying coverage to people with medical problems or charging them more. Insurers could not charge women more.

MEDICAID: Expands the federal-state Medicaid insurance program for the poor to cover people with incomes up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, $29,327 a year for a family of four. Childless adults would be covered for the first time, starting in 2014. The federal government would pay 100 percent of costs for covering newly eligible individuals through 2016. A special deal that would have given Nebraska 100 percent federal financing for newly eligible Medicaid recipients in perpetuity is eliminated. A different, one-time deal negotiated by Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu for her state, Louisiana, worth as much as $300 million, remains.

TAXES: Dramatically scales back a Senate-passed tax on high-cost insurance plans that was opposed by House Democrats and labor unions. The tax would be delayed until 2018, and the thresholds at which it is imposed would be $10,200 for individuals and $27,500 for families. To make up for the lost revenue, the bill applies an increased Medicare payroll tax to the investment income and to the wages of individuals making more than $200,000, or married couples above $250,000. The tax on investment income would be 3.8 percent.

PRESCRIPTION DRUGS: Gradually closes the "doughnut hole" coverage gap in the Medicare prescription drug benefit that seniors fall into once they have spent $2,830. Seniors who hit the gap this year will receive a $250 rebate. Beginning in 2011, seniors in the gap receive a discount on brand name drugs, initially 50 percent off. When the gap is completely eliminated in 2020, seniors will still be responsible for 25 percent of the cost of their medications until Medicare's catastrophic coverage kicks in.

EMPLOYER RESPONSIBILITY: As in the Senate bill, businesses are not required to offer coverage. Instead, employers are hit with a fee if the government subsidizes their workers' coverage. The $2,000-per-employee fee would be assessed on the company's entire work force, minus an allowance. Companies with 50 or fewer workers are exempt from the requirement. Part-time workers are included.