Monday, September 28, 2009

Obamacare: Taxes for Everyone!

This column by Dick Morris outlines the way every American will be faced with taxes to subsidize Obamacare.

Start with the mandate that falls on those whose welfare is the supposed object of the entire program — the uninsured. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the average uninsured person or family will have to pay between 15 and 20 percent of his or their total income on health insurance (counting premiums, deductibles and co-payments) before any of the subsidy in the Baucus bill kicks in...

Then there is the tax on health insurance premiums that is to finance about a quarter of the subsidy for the uninsured. This tax, billed as only to be levied on “gold-plated” policies, will, in fact, reach down to the average American. The Baucus bill specifies that the tax of 35 percent would be put on all premiums over $8,000 for an individual and on proportionately higher premiums for families. Current estimates are that about one-tenth of the current health insurance policies would be taxable. But the $8,000 premium level that will trigger coverage is not indexed for inflation, let alone for medical inflation, which typically runs twice as high. ObamaCare will take effect in 2013. By then, the percentage of Americans subject to the tax will doubtless expand dramatically...

And then there is the final piece of the puzzle — the $500 billion cut in Medicare that will pay for the bulk of the subsidy under the bill.

It's hard to believe there are people who honestly think they will get healthcare for free.