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A Layman’s Guide to Understanding the Real Story
AUTHOR: RYAN FRAZIER (CITY COUNCILLOR, AURORA, COLORADO)
Politics Will Decide the Fate of Your Healthcare Forever

The new Commissioner will set the health care standards and benefit levels with recommendations from an ‘Advisory Committee’. The Commissioner is appointed by politicians in Washington and members of the Committee by the President. Our health will now be subject to the political whims of whoever happens to be in power; our health benefits will be politicized forever as the Commissioner and Committee will be appointed by politicians in power.

Discrimination and Lower Quality Healthcare for Older Americans

This bill will force price controls on all Medicare Advantage (MA) plans (a supplemental plan to basic Medicare coverage). The bill also grants federal government unprecedented power to reject any and all MA plans as well as restricts MA plan payments to those of the scaled-down basic Medicare plan. The result is that the supplemental plan becomes crippled and ineffective. It will no longer be able to offer innovative benefits to those 65 and older; those citizens will lose the quality of healthcare they currently receive.

Loss of American Jobs

You may ask, ‘How does government-run healthcare equate to a loss of jobs?”. The independent Council of Economic Providers estimates a loss of up to 5.5 million jobs due to an imposed ‘play or pay’ tax on all businesses, small and large. Instead of absorbing the costs caused by additional taxes and imposed benefit standards, employers will be forced to lay off workers in fear of brutal ‘non-compliance’ penalties. (See “All Americans Will Make Less Money” below.)

Taxes, Taxes, Taxes, and more Taxes.

• Individuals who do not purchase healthcare will now be taxed. (And, oh yes, do not forget that individuals only ‘option’ is the ‘public option’. See additional information below.) If individuals cannot afford to purchase the public healthcare program due to rising costs, they will still be penalized with paying a non-compliance tax. So, they are hit twice – some still will not have health coverage and they will be paying a fee.
• Payroll taxes on companies that don’t play by strict government rules. (Play or Pay)
• 5.4% tax on over half of all small business owners – the job creators that fuel the American economy and most likely the person(s) that created your job.
• Unprecedented ‘wheelchair tax’ which imposes a new tax on all medical devices. The Congressional Budget Office stated the taxes will be passed on in the form of higher prices for the devices and ultimately higher premiums to you. This essentially perpetuates the very problem of rising costs which the bill is supposedly reducing!
• After 2015, your state taxes will rise significantly because this bill will expand Medicaid by billions but will only pay for this expansion until 2014, forcing the states to pay for the expanded program.
• If an employee decides to drop their employer’s plan and receive the government plan, the employer is still forced to pay 8% of that employees salary towards that government plan, even though the employer is also paying a substantial cost to a group plan to insure the rest of its employees.
• A greater portion of middle-class Americans’ money will be taxed. (See information below.)

Who said, “Your Private Plan will Remain the Same??!”

The Government will force your private plan to give you less benefits and will increase your tax burden in the process.

There will be a forced reduction of your Health Savings Accounts (HSA), Medical Savings Accounts, Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA), and Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRA) to $2500. From this measly $2500, you will no longer be allowed reimbursement for ANY over the counter medicines from these accounts! So, not only will you have fewer benefits but more of your income will be taxed as few dollars are allowed in these tax-free accounts. This give the government’s money-grubbing hands $8.2 billion of Americans’ hard-earned money and they will get this money through reducing the quality of your benefits and taxing you at the same time.

The ‘Public Option’ Leaves No Options for Individuals

If you do not receive health insurance through your employer, it will be illegal to purchase healthcare in the private market. All individuals will be forced to purchase the government plan or be taxed. This is one of the greatest attacks on our liberties. Americans should have choices in their healthcare. This strips us of our rights.

Unlimited and Unchecked Federal Power over Private Plans

After five years, the government is empowered to impose any regulation and stipulation they wish on the private insurance sector. Your insurance assuredly will not remain the same. This will increase costs to your employer causing many employers to cease offering private insurance. If your employer chooses not to cover you, you will have no option and will be forced to join the public ‘option’ or be taxed.

All Americans will make Less Money

Follow the logic: Employers will be forced to meet strict, far-reaching coverage requirements. For those business owners who cannot afford to meet those requirements, those business will be slapped with an 8% additional payroll tax.** It will be illegal to pay employees less in order to absorb additional costs of new coverage requirements. The consequence would be that employers will hire fewer people and/or lay off workers to avoid breaking the law by paying workers less. Employers may also absorb the cost by simply paying new hires less for the same jobs. This translates into a net loss in jobs and less money in Americans’ pockets at the end of the day.

**This 8% tax is pro-rated for smaller businesses; however the tax is not indexed for inflation. So, eventually, everyone will be paying at least 8% because the threshold amounts will become irrelevant over time.

Unlimited and unchecked Federal Power over Private Business Could Result in Loss of Private Plans for Millions of Americans

Under this plan, government will have unlimited power to search and “investigate” your business for any reason that would lead it to believe you, the business owner, are non-compliant with new Government regulations. There will be a penalty of $100 PER EMPLOYEE, PER DAY if the Government deems you ‘non-compliant’, which could effectively force you out of business or simply cause you, the business owner, to cease offering benefits to your employees. Millions of Americans could lose their coverage under this scenario.

“Deficit Neutrality” Is a Joke: The American Debt Would Increase by Billions

This bill claims ‘deficit neutrality’; however, the Democrats have introduced a sister bill, H.R. 3961 that will increase the deficit by $200 Billion.

Furthermore, the accounting model of this “deficit neutrality” claim is severely flawed. The payment model for health programs in the bill undermine this ‘deficit neutrality’ claim. The Long-Term Care Program (LTCP) under the bill is one such example. If you would choose to opt-in to this supplemental program, you pay (‘contribute’) into the program to help pay for it. According to the bill, these individual contributions will actually pay for other programs written in the legislation for 10 years. The Democratic Senate HELP Committee said on record that after 10 years, the federal deficit would be increased substantially. Democrat Senator Kent Conrad called the program payment model a ‘Ponzi scheme’.

Violation of States Rights

States’ ability to ‘Opt-Out’ is a misleading fallacy. The truth is, according to this bill, states CANNOT opt-out of the program IF they have established medical malpractice caps in their laws! It is a known fact that frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits increase physician’s insurance costs by hundreds of thousands annually. It is also a known fact that those costs are currently passed on to patients – you and me. If medical malpractice caps are lifted and inevitably costs further rise for physicians, those rising costs will be passed on to you and I, as HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE CASE! A rise in your healthcare cost when you see the doctor actually PERPETUATES THE VERY CRISIS for millions of Americans that this bill is supposed to eradicate!

Fewer Physicians to Provide Care for those in Need

Doctors will make less money for doing the same amount of work under the new bill. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office states that doctors will make thousands less per year, even accounting for the additional millions of people that will be part of the program. Eventually physicians will opt-out of taking ‘Public Option’ patients because they will make substantially less for the same amount of work.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 21st, 2010 at 6:38 pm and is filed under Current Affairs, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.