lonestar2004 said:

We may know by the end of the week how the Democrats are claiming they will pay for their healthcare plans. News out of the House of Representatives is that they will introduce their bill on either Thursday or Friday of this week.

In the mean time, on Tuesday a caucus meeting with Energy and Commerce Chair Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) will be held on Tuesday to discuss the funding plans. This will be followed by a brief by House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.) while Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) will speak on Friday. Rangel is last because his committee is in charge of finding the tax increases that will pay for the plan.

Democrats also say that the �public option� will be a prominent feature of their bill and will be similar to the current Medicare system.


Taxes on soda pop, a national sales tax, new taxes on healthcare benefits from employers, and a surtax on people making more than $250,000 annually are all being considered to help pay for the healthcare �reform.�

If Democrats settle on taxing healthcare benefits from employers, they will find a tough road to get the plan passed as the majority of Americans are against such a tax.

http://www.publiusforum.com/2009/07/07/democrats-will-reveal-how-they-want-to-pay-for-healthcare/



"new taxes on healthcare benefits from employers"




first cap and tax and now this!!



I thought Obama said nobody making less then 250k was going to get a tax increase?


was he joking?

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"new taxes on healthcare benefits from employers"

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zouden said:

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"new taxes on healthcare benefits from employers"

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Isn't that sorta like what you have now? Those employers would otherwise be paying for private health insurance, so it's not such a big difference.

Wait... taxes on healthcare benefits? Does that means you'd be paying tax on benefits you pay your employees? That seems odd.

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zouden said:

Yes, I agree. They will be fucked. But health young males with no family are doing pretty well compared to other demographics. I'm sure they can handle it. I'm more concerned about those who have no health insurance because they can't afford it. That's a much larger group.

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zappaisgod said:

People pay tax on their income.  For years people have been receiving, as income but not monetary, a certain benefit known as health insurance.  This was not, for tax purposes, considered income and they thus avoided paying payroll tax (15%) plus income tax (varies) on that income known as the benefit which is health insurance.  Everybody else who had to buy their own health insurance had to pay for it with after tax dollars.  People who got company provided (I specifically did not say "paid") health insurance have been scamming the rest of the country for decades.

A few years ago one of my guys said he wanted health insurance benefits.  I set it up so that it cost me zero (i.e. he got paid less).  After awhile when he never went to a doctor he said fuck it, it's stupid.  No wife, no kids, he chose.  There are two groups that mandatory health insurance fucks.  Healthy males and taxpayers.  Healthy male taxpayers with no family are completely cornholed.  Think about it.  They don't have those troublesome vaginas, they never get pregnant and they are virtually immune to everything except stupidity.  Think about it all my healthy young male friends on the Shroomery.  Even if you don't earn shit you are still going to get fucked because they are going to pull a Massachusetts on your ass and make you buy insurance you neither want nor need.  To pay for vaginas that you will not get to use.

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zappaisgod said:

Anybody who doesn't have health insurance because they can't afford it is covered by Medicare/Medicaid.  I repeat, the truly needy are already covered.

You have no fucking idea what you are talking about regarding the US health care and you prove it over and over again.

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Medicaid does not provide medical assistance for all poor persons. Even under the broadest provisions of the Federal statute (except for emergency services for certain persons), the Medicaid program does not provide health care services, even for very poor persons, unless they are in one of the designated eligibility groups.

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Both the percentage and number of people without health insurance decreased in 2007. The percentage without health insurance was 15.3 percent in 2007, down from 15.8 percent in 2006, and the number of uninsured was 45.7 million, down from 47.0 million (Table 6)

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Economic Status
The proportion of people not covered by health insurance is lower among people with higher income. In 2007, 24.5 percent of people in households with annual incomes of less than $25,000 had no health insurance coverage. Uninsured rates decreased for each consecutive household income group to 21.1 percent for households with incomes of $25,000 to $49,999, 14.5 percent for households with incomes of $50,000 to $74,999, and 7.8 percent for households with incomes of $75,000 or more. Among the four household income groups in Table 6, the uninsured rate was not statistically different in 2007 from 2006 in the lower three groups. The uninsured rate fell for people in households in the highest income group to 7.8 percent in 2007, from 8.5 percent in 2006.

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zouden said:

except for those 45.7 million people who aren't.

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zappaisgod said:

Anybody who doesn't have health insurance because they can't afford it is covered by Medicare/Medicaid.  I repeat, the truly needy are already covered.

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zouden said:

"I repeat, the truly needy are already covered." - except for those 45.7 million people who aren't.

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zouden said:

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"new taxes on healthcare benefits from employers"

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Isn't that sorta like what you have now? Those employers would otherwise be paying for private health insurance, so it's not such a big difference.

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Doc_T said:

Employer-funded health insurance is heavily subsidized by tax breaks.

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luvdemshrooms said:

zouden said:

except for those 45.7 million people who aren't.

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A little reading will show 45 million to be a number long shown to be bogus.

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I'm just getting it from the Census.

lonestar2004 said:

and is this major reform that Obama wants going to now cover those 45.7 million?

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Isn't it? I thought that was the whole point.

Anyway, I find it interesting that the US spends a higher proportion of GDP on healthcare than Australia, but only 85% of the population are covered.

zouden said:

I'm just getting it from the Census.

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We pay a subsidy to the rest of the world by paying full price while everybody else gets a discount.

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We also pay more because we don't have assholes denying care as much as in, say, Britain, where fatties and smokers can't get surgery and cancer care sucks cock.  Difficult births are exported from Canada (Ontario!) and hip replacements take years of waiting.

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And here is another thing that you just can't seem to understand:

INSURANCE IS NOT CARE!  Insurance is not care.  It is a financial instrument

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