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Originally posted by iamcamouflage
Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
Originally posted by lee anoma
Anyone looking to these bozos for direction will be in a frenzied panic without even reading paragraph one.
The people who tell the average american that their taxes are going to go up are flat out lying.
Excise Tax on Uninsured Individuals – Individuals who fail to maintain minimum essential coverage will be subject to a penalty equal to $750. The fee for an uninsured individual under age 18 is one-half of the adult fee.
Excise Tax on High-Cost Employer Plans – The federal government would impose a 40% tax on the value of employer-sponsored health coverage exceeding certain thresholds. Those levels are projected to be $8,500 for self only and $23,000 for any other level by the year 2013. This excise was announced with fanfare by the White House and labor unions in January and remains in the final bill.
ncrease in additional tax on distributions from Health Savings Accounts and Archer Medical Savings Accounts not used for qualified medical expenses – An increase from 10% to 20% on taxes of money in a health savings account not used for qualified medical expenses. For Archer medical savings accounts, an increase from 15% to 20%.
Additional Hospital Insurance Tax on High-Income Taxpayers – High income tax payers, making on a joint return over $250,000 and a standard return over $200,000, are required to pay an additional 0.5% of wages. This applies to both self-employed, and regularly employed individuals.
Fees on Health Plans – A fee applied to all health insurance providers based upon net premiums and any third party fees associated with the administration of those programs. The fees will total $6.7 billion annually. This figure begins at $8 billion in the Reconciliation Act and rises to $14.3 billion by 2018.
Tax on individuals without acceptable health care coverage – A 2.5% income tax on individuals who do not have health care coverage, limited to a cost less than the average national health care premium.
Taxes on Pharmaceutical Companies – The government will extract a fee of $2.3 billion annually from the pharmaceutical industry (Section 9008 (b)).
Taxes on medical device manufacturers – The government will extract a fee of $2 billion annually from medical device makers (Section 1405).
Simply, you have nationalized healthcare by proxy.” writes Jonah Goldberg of the LA Times.
“Insurance companies are now heavily regulated government contractors. Way to get big business out of Washington! They will clear a small, government-approved profit on top of their government-approved fees. Then, when healthcare costs rise — and they will — Democrats will insist, yet again, that the profit motive is to blame and out from this Obamacare Trojan horse will pour another army of liberals demanding a more honest version of single-payer.”
“The Obama administration has turned the insurance industry into the Blackwater of socialized medicine.” Goldberg concludes.
Originally posted by iamcamouflage
reply to post by Schaden
Thank you for the input. And with regards to the estate tax, I couldnt remember the exact number and was too lazy to look it up but I knew it was outside of the income range for the vast majority of the population.
Health care reform is an issue that we as Americans should be more than happy to pay for. I currently have employer health care and I take really good care of myself. I'm aware that my taxes will not go up due to my low income but I would be more than willing to pay a small percentage more to help those even less fortunate than me.
I am far from rich but there are people, many families worse off than me. And I am more than willing to offer some of what i have to benefit others.
I am always at a loss when seeing the poor defend the rich, under the assumption that one day they will be in their shoes. Growing up my parents would refer to people like this as, "too poor to be a Republican". There is a serious mis-communication when you have someone in a trailer house, worried about the DEATH TAX(scary voice)
If you are not in the top 5% by the age of 30, you will most likely never get there.
Thems the facts
EDIT: Schaden, you should read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. He discusses the importance of when and where we are born with regards to success. Great book, great author.
[edit on 26-3-2010 by iamcamouflage]
Originally posted by marg6043
reply to post by justinsweatt
Yes but the main part of the regulation of the insurance companies that would have striped them from increasing premiums was never even mentioned in the bill.
This bill does not limit insurance company rate hikes. Private insurers continue to be exempt from anti-trust laws, and are free to raise rates without fear of competition in many areas of the country.
This will enable private insurance companies to find loopholes to bite back on the policy holders budgets.
House administrators estimate that Capitol switchboard operators are fielding roughly 40,000 calls per hour from constituents and that perhaps just as many callers are experiencing busy signals a full day after radio host Rush Limbaugh gave his listening audience the Capitol switchboard phone number and encouraged them to call it.
That means that in an eight-hour window, the Capitol is being deluged with more than 300,000 phone calls, said Jeff Ventura, spokesman for the Chief Administrator’s Office. The barrage is about 10 times what the switchboard usually receives, he added.
The Max Tax: Baucus Plan Fails to Control Growth of Insurance Premiums.
Democrats have shied away from regulating premiums in the face of charges from business leaders and Republicans that controlling what insurers charge would be meddling too much in the private sector.
As a result, while states have long supervised what companies charge for mandated automobile and homeowners insurance, the idea has been largely banished from the health care debate. . . .
Nor are lawmakers seriously considering any proposals to regulate what doctors, hospitals, drug makers and other health care providers charge — a strategy used by several European countries to control health care spending.
Miracle of the ages. Two days after the historic health care bill passed — alternately known in some circles as Armageddon — initial polls are showing that health care approval ratings have gone up (also President Obama’s). A USA Today/Gallup Poll finds that “49%-40% of those surveyed say it was ‘a good thing’ rather than a bad one that Congress passed the bill.” This is in contrast to last week when there was “a plurality against it.”
...
The American people did not have clearly formed opinions on the content of this bill. They had vague opinions on the bill that were heavily influenced by the media narrative surrounding the development and legislative process of the bill’s progress.
And as anyone who has been watching cable news and/or reading much of the blogosphere knows the media narrative the last six months has been a roller coaster of Tea Parties, and nuclear options, Armageddons, 9/12 movements — in short, a whole lot of name calling. And name calling is a lot easier to talk and write, and read, and listen to than, say, the details and explanation of a thousands page long health care bill. And it was fueled in large part by some fairly strident rhetoric on the right. Hello Frankenstein?
Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
No problem, marg. I'm always glad to see your posts. It's hard to keep the subjects separated (I mess up myself) especially when we're posting in several threads.
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Was HCR actually Unpopular, or did the Media Make it So?
Miracle of the ages. Two days after the historic health care bill passed — alternately known in some circles as Armageddon — initial polls are showing that health care approval ratings have gone up (also President Obama’s). A USA Today/Gallup Poll finds that “49%-40% of those surveyed say it was ‘a good thing’ rather than a bad one that Congress passed the bill.” This is in contrast to last week when there was “a plurality against it.”
...
The American people did not have clearly formed opinions on the content of this bill. They had vague opinions on the bill that were heavily influenced by the media narrative surrounding the development and legislative process of the bill’s progress.
And as anyone who has been watching cable news and/or reading much of the blogosphere knows the media narrative the last six months has been a roller coaster of Tea Parties, and nuclear options, Armageddons, 9/12 movements — in short, a whole lot of name calling. And name calling is a lot easier to talk and write, and read, and listen to than, say, the details and explanation of a thousands page long health care bill. And it was fueled in large part by some fairly strident rhetoric on the right. Hello Frankenstein?
I think this is a really important point. The people aren't aware of how much the media forms their opinions. I'm really uncomfortable with giving the media that much power, but they have it, they know they have it and it's clear by many posts here that they have it.
I also agree that Obama's numbers went up because he's a oscar meyer wiener. Everyone likes to stand beside a oscar meyer wiener.
[edit on 3/26/2010 by Benevolent Heretic]
Originally posted by joey_hv
The truth is that 50% oppose this health bill:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/e5d8fdb5b66d.jpg[/atsimg]
and where you should be looking for poll results...
www.realclearpolitics.com...
RealClearPolitics is an American conservative-leaning[2] political blog, news and polling data aggregator which claims to be non-partisan