News about the pinheaded things by politicians and governemt.
Posts tagged Health Care Bill
Senator Nelson. We knew what he was, now we know the price.
Dec 19th
Well, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid finally seems to have his 60th vote.
Senator Nelson has announced support of the Senate Health Care Bill. The cost? Revised language on Abortion, and an exemption for Nebraska in regards to Medicare expenditures.
That’s right. The Federal Government will pay for the Medicare expenditures for the State of Nebraska. All those other States with Senators that joined earlier will just have to pay those Medicare expenditures, themselves.
That means that not only will states like California have to pay the Medicare costs to take care of the citizens of California (including illegal aliens) they will have to pay for the Medicare costs for taking care of the citizens of Nebraska.
Governor Schwrazenegger has already stated additional Medicare costs would bankrupt his state.
This reminds me of the joke about the millionaire that propositions another man’s wife. After saying yes to $1 Million, he then offers $50. She get’s offended and asks what kind of woman he thinks she is.
His response? We’ve already established what kind of woman you are. Now we’re just negotiating price.
Well, we now know what kind of man Senator Nelson is and we know the price.
CBO Report: Senate Bill will cause Insurance Premiums to increase
Dec 3rd
It’s been awhile since I posted. I got sick. Then busy. Then sick again. (I know, no need to post personal problems.)
Anyway, the latest CBO report on the effect of the Senate’s latest Health Care Reform Bill undermines the arguments being made by the Democrats. The keep saying that the bill will lower Health Costs, but according to the CBO report, insurance premiums for anybody buying a personal insurance policy will face increased insurance premiums.
So much for lower cost.
At least for individuals.
One thing you need to remember in this entire debate, is that certain people have a Government centric view. This is especially true for long time Washington insiders. Meaning most of our elected officials.
To them, as long as the Health Care Cost for the Government go down, that is all that really matters. When these people talk about lowering costs, they’re not talking about your costs.
It gets even worse when you take into account the way the CBO scores things. The CBO makes certain assumptions, and sometimes those assumptions just aren’t realistic.
In the case of the Senate Bll, the CBO neglects to factor in the fact that a large number of healthy individuals will just refuse to purchase health insurance. It just isn’t worth it. Not when the bill guarantees your ability to purchase insurance after you get sick and caps the premiums Insurers can charge.
Insurance premiums for everyone will go up once you factor those provisions in.
Health Care Bill: Taxes Taxes Taxes
Nov 8th
The Health Care Bill currently being debated in the House has a large number of Tax provisions, some of them are just dumb-founding.
Sec. 501 revises the Internal Revenue Code to impose a tax on any individual without “Adequate” Health Coverage. One of the major problems here is the fact that the Federal Government gets to decide what constitutes “adequate” coverage. Anyone with an insurance plan that does not meet that definition has a tax of 2.5% imposed on them.
That means that many individuals will face the choice of paying for coverage they don’t need or paying an additional tax. At least as long as non-qualifying insurance plans are available (not likely given this bill.) No unmarried, childless male needs an insurance plan that covers maternity care or well baby coverage, but this bill imposes those requirements on Insurers.
This provision either forces people to pay more for additional coverage (which they may not need) or pay more in taxes. Either way, many people will face higher out-of-pocket costs as a result.
Sec. 512 Imposes a new tax on Businesses that don’t offer their employees health coverage (and remember, any Employer offered coverage must meet the Government imposed requirements, giving employers ample reason not to offer coverage). The tax is equal to 8% of the employee’s wages.
Read that carefully. 8% of the employee’s wages. This is not an 8% tax rate. That would be a tax on the employer’s profits. This is instead, an increase in the cost of doing business, and could increase costs for some business enough to put them out of business. This is especially true of those businesses that don’t make enough currently to offer their employee’s health insurance.
The costs associated with emplying workers is typically the highest expense for any business. Increasing it by 8% is a cost many businesses just can’t afford to absorb.
Sec. 532 Decreases the amount of money that can be contributed to FSAs (Flexible Spending Arrangements). This forces individuals with those plans to face higher taxes.
Sec. 533 Increases the penalty for “nonqualified” distributions from Health Savings Accounts from 10% to 20%. Again, another tax hike.
Sec. 551 Imposes an additional tax on “High Income” Individuals. The rate is 5.4% for individuals making $500,000 or $1,000,000 for joint filers. FYI, many of these people are small business owners. Taking money from them can result in less money for expanding a business, especially during a period of tight credit. This is coupled with the phase-out of George Bush’s tax cuts, which lowered the top marginal rate. The top rate will be 45% after this.
This is coupled with State income taxes. This means many of these people will be facing income tax rates well over 50%. How hard do you think people will work once the Government starts taking the majority of what is earned. When people stop working to earn more than a particular amount, because it just isn’t worth the effort, there is no longer any income for the Government to tax.
BTW, this particular provision id not indexed for inflation. Remember what occurred with the Alternative Minimum Tax (ATM)?
Sec. 552 Imposes a new 2.5% Excise/Sales Tax on the sale of Medical Devices. This is going to increase the costs associated with the use of those devices. If your Hospital buys a new MRI, they will now have an additional cost, one that they will have to pass on to the people using that Hospital.
If the idea is to lower medical costs, why impose a provision guaranteed to increase medical costs?
Hiding the true cost of the Health Care Bill
Nov 7th
I have posted previously on the fact that the costs of Health Care Bill’s currently before Congress aren’t accurately reflected in the CBO’s scoring of those bills.
The bills shift costs of Health Care away from Medicare and onto Medicaid. Because the latter is administered by the States, this serves to shift the cost off of the Federal Government’s books. It instead forces the States to pick up much of the cost of the Health Care Bills. These costs need to be considered in order to get a true picture of the cost associated with the bill.
Then there is the “Doctor Fix.” This is $250 Billion in spending for Medicare that has been pushed into another bill. However, this spending is necessary in order to get the Health Care Bill passed and should be associated with the bill. Including this spending increases the cost of the bill well over $1 Trillion and causes the bill to increase deficit spending by over $200 billion over the first 10 years of the program.
Then there is the budgetary game Congress plays in regards to timing. In this case, Congress immediately implements all the taxes related to the bill, but it defers much of the spending until 2013. This is when the “Health Care Exchanges” are created. This includes a public insurance program.
Then there is the latest accounting gimmick that NRO has pointed out. When the Health Care Bill proposed under Bill Clinton was proposed, the CBO included the cost associated with the mandate that all Americans carry health insurance in the cost of the bill. This cost was 50% more than the government incurred costs.
The cost this bill imposes on the American people could be as high as $1.5 Trillion.
Congress has shifted the costs associated with Health Care of the books of the Federal Government, and imposed them onto the States and the American people.
The true cost of Health Care is closer to 2 and a half Trillion Dollars.
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