Romney: "It's Not a Tax!"

[Sandy]

http://blogs.ajc.com/political-insider- ... not-a-tax/

[Dave Roberts]

If Romney wins, he could give us the first Etch-a-Sketch" Presidency--a new interpretation every day of what he meant to say yesterday.

[ET]

Who cares what word is used? In the end it boils down to a MASSIVE expansion of government interference in our lives. Whether it gets called a "tax" or a "penalty" is irrelevant to me outside of the legal word games that get played in legal proceedings. The field of power for Congress is now virtually unlimited. Whatever small scraps of the notion of limited government remained in the Constitution pretty much got thrown out in the trash with this decision. As Jefferson once wrote, "The Constitution... is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary which they may twist and shape into any form they please." Such has the "despotic branch" of 5 done with this ruling.

In the real world, it IS a tax. I'm trying desperately to dig up an article I ran across at the end of last week. It was about employees that were now being forced by Obamacare to pay more for their health insurance because Obamacare dictates certain coverages such as no-fee annual physicals. Basically this forces people to spend money for health insurance "benefits" that they may not use and reduces the amount of money they have to spend on other things that they may have purchased in the economy. In effect, Obamacare decreases the ability of everyday folks to engage in economic activity and help the economy recover.

For example, I've only bothered to get one physical in the last 5 years or so just because I haven't made the time for it or bothered to schedule it. It only costs $40 or so, so it's not the money. So now if Obamacare makes my health insurance premium go up to pay for a level of coverage that I don't use or don't need, then of what benefit is that to me? I've now lost more of my income to a "tax" or "penalty" that essentially goes down a black hole or to pay for someone else. I've lost that money that could go to a waitress, restaurant, Home Depot, a hotel room at the beach or any other number of things. For the sake of a relative handful of people, the rest of us get screwed out of some of our money. Does it really matter for those of us who live in the real world whether you call it a "penalty" or a "tax"?

Being this is July 4th, I say let's just call it another "loss of liberty" that is so much a part of the "progressive" tyranny of do-gooders. Their "progress" is bought and paid for in the amount of liberty which they can consume and take away from others.

P.S. And oh, Sandy, you're not telling we conservatives anything that we haven't been saying for the last 6 or 8 months. Romney most certainly isn't the poster child for attacking Obamacare. If he's going to do so, he should do it from a Federalist perspective. Obamacare is an unConstitutional reach of power, but Romneycare is valid because of the 9th and 10th Amendments to the Constitution. If the people of Massachusetts want to play around with more socialized medicine, then have at it. Just don't try to force it on me via Congress mandating such idiocy to the rest of the country.

Now I'm off to watch "Redtails" in honor of the 4th.

[Dave Roberts]

Ed, I need to find your doctor. My last physical with blood work and an EKG was almost $300 before the negotiated price for my particular insurance kicked in. Where do you find $40 physicals?

[Haruo]

Who cares what word is used? In the end it boils down to a MASSIVE expansion of government interference in our lives.

Obviously a lot of people either care, or are afraid someone will care and thus act as if they care, or think that if they can get people to care it will help their political fortunes.

The questions of whether the interference involved is MASSIVE or not, and whether it is good or not, and whether it is best done at the federal level or elsewhere or nowhere, are independent of the question of who cares, and why, whether it is called a tax.

[Sandy]

The government has a constitutional responsibility to protect its citizens, not only from military invasion, but from anything which interferes with their life, liberty, or the pursuit of their happiness. The health insurance business is proving itself to be a threat to at least two of those interests in a number of ways. It is rapidly becoming a means of the redistribution of wealth, to the point where it even raised an alarm among some officials in the Bush administration, especially in the fact that premiums people pay to help cover health care costs are going to pay the hundred-million dollar salaries of insurance company executive, and pay for expensive perks. That's going on while they are demanding more money from individuals for patient care and premium costs have soared way past ten times the inflation rate.

It's not a "massive" tax, because Americans who have health insurance won't pay it, and those who obtain health insurance to cover costs they are now fobbing off on to everyone else can avoid it. In that it will provide the minimum level of health coverage, it is, as Romney says, a "fee" because they receive something directly in exchange for it. Why someone would want to pay $200 to the government for what they will get in return when $200 paid to a health insurer will get them twice as much, but that's their choice.

Of course, Romney has to cover his rear because the federal program, declared constitutional by the Supreme Court that has the full constitutional authority to do so, and by a Republican, conservative Justice at that, is modeled off of the program he instituted in Massachusetts, and he doesn't want to look like the flip flopper that he is. But the bottom line is that a majority of Americans see the need for genuine health care reform, and if he makes that an election issue, he'll lose. As many as 15% of those who say in polls that they don't approve of Obamacare are political liberals who don't think this plan goes far enough, and see an Obama victory as a chance to advance to the single payer, government controlled system they wanted in the first place. Do the math. As that translates into votes, it's a loser for Romney. He'd better stick to running on the economy, if his record can support that.

[ET]

Ed, I need to find your doctor. My last physical with blood work and an EKG was almost $300 before the negotiated price for my particular insurance kicked in. Where do you find $40 physicals?

Regular co-pay for my insurance when going to a specialist. I suppose it's one of the benefits of working for evil, greedy, big business in my community.

[Haruo]

What sort of coverage do the folks who work at your local Wal-Mart have, I wonder? Hereabouts that corporation has a bad habit of underpaying people (and deliberately limiting most employees' hours so they do not qualify as "full-time"), then providing them with information on how to collect food stamps, medical assistance and other social services. Heaven forbid their stockholders should be required to pay any "onerous" taxes or carry decent health insurance themselves... The "evils" of big business (and of big bureaucracies) vary from case to case; my guess is that your coverage has to do with your skill set's rarity more than with the generosity of your employers.

[Dave Roberts]

Ed, I need to find your doctor. My last physical with blood work and an EKG was almost $300 before the negotiated price for my particular insurance kicked in. Where do you find $40 physicals?

Regular co-pay for my insurance when going to a specialist. I suppose it's one of the benefits of working for evil, greedy, big business in my community.

Obviously then, if you had not had insurance, it would have been $300 or more, right?

[ET]

The government has a constitutional responsibility to protect its citizens, not only from military invasion, but from anything which interferes with their life, liberty, or the pursuit of their happiness.

"protect us from anything which interferes" with our life, liberty or pursuit of happiness? and double That so fundamentally flawed it's no wonder there's such a political division in this country. Government most certainly has certain responsibilities to protect us, but certainly not anything bordering on what could be conceivably be an infinite number of things that might interfere with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

So in order to supposedly protect us, government interferes with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in the name of protecting our life, liberty and pursuit of happiness? How much more convoluted can you get? Very 1984-ish.

If I desire to purchase a health insurance plan that covers X and Obama decides that all health care plans must cover X+Y and that I must pay for such a plan, he has thus interfered with my life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I now must use money to pay for something that I do not want and could have been spent on my "pursuit of happiness". I no longer have the ability to purchase plan X because Obama has decided that I should not have the liberty to do so. So if he's violating my liberty and pursuit of happiness by making me pay more for something I do not wish to buy and do not feel is necessary for my life, then by your own declaration government has violated it's constitutional responsibility.

It's not a "massive" tax...

There's a very political reason why most of the costs and regulatory burdens of Obamacare don't kick in until 2013. I would venture to guess that any cost estimates currently given about Obamacare do absolutely nothing to attempt to calculate the regulatory burden that will be placed on American businesses when the thing gets fully implemented. Nor do I imagine they calculate the cost of additional government agencies and federal employees that will be used to dictate and enforce compliance. Of course, the folks supporting this will be the loudest whiners when some American business decides it's gotten too expensive to do business over here and decides to make things elsewhere and ship them over here to sell.

I'll also predict that you'll see businesses being reluctant to hire for the next year or so until they know how screwed they're going to be by Obamacare regulations and bureaucracy.

It will also be interesting to see how many people lose their employer-paid health insurance and are dumped into these idiotic exchanges because the incentive for businesses to do so is so low. But that's another matter.

[ET]

What sort of coverage do the folks who work at your local Wal-Mart have, I wonder? Hereabouts that corporation has a bad habit of underpaying people (and deliberately limiting most employees' hours so they do not qualify as "full-time"), then providing them with information on how to collect food stamps, medical assistance and other social services. Heaven forbid their stockholders should be required to pay any "onerous" taxes or carry decent health insurance themselves... The "evils" of big business (and of big bureaucracies) vary from case to case; my guess is that your coverage has to do with your skill set's rarity more than with the generosity of your employers.

I can't speak to Wal-mart coverages, but if we blow up Wal-marts and go back to the good ole days of mom and pop stores, what kind of health care coverage do you think mom-and-pop are going to provide? Did those mom-and-pop stores in pre-Walmart days pay better wages? "Underpaying people" is relative. "Decent" is relative. There's usually a large gap between how we wish things could be and what economic reality dictates them to be.

The health care options in my company are available from the hourlies up through management.

Some 20 years ago when I was working at an hourly at my company they deliberately limited us part-time workers to part-time hours and managers routinely monitored our hours so that we didn't work full-time hours. The job was a part-time job and managers were suppose to manage it with part-time employees.

[ET]

Ed, I need to find your doctor. My last physical with blood work and an EKG was almost $300 before the negotiated price for my particular insurance kicked in. Where do you find $40 physicals?

Regular co-pay for my insurance when going to a specialist. I suppose it's one of the benefits of working for evil, greedy, big business in my community.

Obviously then, if you had not had insurance, it would have been $300 or more, right?

Oh, I'm sure it would have, Dave. That's one of the main problems with our health care system. With something around 85% of Americans getting their health care premiums paid by or highly subsidized through their employer (thanks to the corporate welfare embedded in the tax code to provide that benefit), most Americans are clueless as to what medical costs truly are and have almost zero incentive to price shop for services or to use their purchasing power to drive down the cost.

Most certainly there are problems with the health insurance industry, but I believe the solution lies not in instituting a government monopoly on providing those services, but on rearranging things so that there is more choice and more competition in providing those services. If I work and have $500 to spend on health care, you can rest assured I'll be fare more concerned with how much things cost than if someone just gives me $500 of your money and tells me "get you some health care and there's plenty more where that came from".

[Dave Roberts]

Ed, I hear that you are saying that you would rather your company pay twice what it should for insurance than for everyone to get coverage. The way it works now is that when you go to the doctor as a paying patient, your bill is padded so that doctors can cover their unpaid bills and charity care. I guess you prefer that your company get soaked rather than having that responsibility spread to everyone. Is that what I'm reading?

[Dave Roberts]

I guess I've subsidized a lot of care for other people. My last inpatient stay was in 1990, but my premiums are rated by age, not by health.

[ET]

Ed, I hear that you are saying that you would rather your company pay twice what it should for insurance than for everyone to get coverage. The way it works now is that when you go to the doctor as a paying patient, your bill is padded so that doctors can cover their unpaid bills and charity care. I guess you prefer that your company get soaked rather than having that responsibility spread to everyone. Is that what I'm reading?

I think you're hearing is off, Dave. Not sure how you got to this conclusion from anything I've stated.

But no, I would not rather my company pay twice what it should for insurance, but nor am I prone to believe that Obamacare or any other government meddling will do anything to change those costs for the better. It may shift them around, hide them or manipulate them, but it won't do anything to reduce them outside of outright rationing or prohibition of services deemed to "costly".

Remember, the estimated cost of Obamacare has already doubled from its original estimate. When it was originally sold, we were told - or rather lied to - that it would cost $940 billion. The CBO has revised that up to $1.76 TRILLION and will most likely be revised up again at some point. I do not believe Obama, Pelosi or Ried didn't know they were seriously underestimating the cost in order to cram it down our throats. And if one is not going to believe we were lied to, then that leaves for that trio to be either fools or completely inept to craft such a bill and to be so utterly wrong about its cost.

[Dave Roberts]

While your source is a bit questionable in its objectivity, ET, I suspect this differs very little from Bush's expansion of Medicare to create Part D. At first that sounded like it could be free. Guess what?

[ET]

While your source is a bit questionable in its objectivity, ET, I suspect this differs very little from Bush's expansion of Medicare to create Part D. At first that sounded like it could be free. Guess what?

Well, Dave, that link is just the one I happened to bookmark. There were similar stories on ABC News, CBS, CNN and FOX. A related article by Factcheck.org provides some clarification here. The costs didn't actually double. What happened was the bill was deceitfully sold to the American public as a "less than 1 trillion" dollar fix, but as I stated in related posts some time back and is mentioned in the FactCheck article, the original $940 billion figure was bogus to begin with because it essentially collected revenue for 10 years and only paid out benefits for 7. The full year costs when fully implemented will be $1.76 trillion or higher, but I fully remember Obama claiming that "his plan" would cost less than a trillion dollars. He lied, or at the least deceived. Joe Wilson was right.

In the end, I expect Obamacare to take a toll similar to Medicare/medicaid when they were announced. Back in the late 1960s, the projected cost for 1990 was about 1/10th of what it actually ended up being. The same will happen with Obamacare. There is no reason historically or logically to think otherwise.

Yes, Bush expanded government with Medicare Part D. I don't remember any talk that made it sound like it could be free, but there were plenty of conservatives, libertarians and Federalists (of which I am one) distraught about the expansion of government under "compassionate conservatism", which was really nothing more than "Big Government run by Republicans". Just like they were plenty upset with Bush and the NCLB education boondoggle.

[Sandy]

ET's sources seem to be the same ones that have been exaggerating and misquoting the Congressional budget office figures ever since the Affordable Health Care Act appeared on the scene. It's nothing even close to that, the numbers just don't add up. Why working class Republicans like ET buy into this, I don't understand, but very little that is put out by any source cited by Romney supporters and Republicans is not even close to accurate.

[KeithE]

While your source is a bit questionable in its objectivity, ET, I suspect this differs very little from Bush's expansion of Medicare to create Part D. At first that sounded like it could be free. Guess what?

Well, Dave, that link is just the one I happened to bookmark. There were similar stories on ABC News, CBS, CNN and FOX. A related article by Factcheck.org provides some clarification here. The costs didn't actually double. What happened was the bill was deceitfully sold to the American public as a "less than 1 trillion" dollar fix, but as I stated in related posts some time back and is mentioned in the FactCheck article, the original $940 billion figure was bogus to begin with because it essentially collected revenue for 10 years and only paid out benefits for 7. The full year costs when fully implemented will be $1.76 trillion or higher, but I fully remember Obama claiming that "his plan" would cost less than a trillion dollars. He lied, or at the least deceived. Joe Wilson was right.

In the end, I expect Obamacare to take a toll similar to Medicare/medicaid when they were announced. Back in the late 1960s, the projected cost for 1990 was about 1/10th of what it actually ended up being. The same will happen with Obamacare. There is no reason historically or logically to think otherwise.

Yes, Bush expanded government with Medicare Part D. I don't remember any talk that made it sound like it could be free, but there were plenty of conservatives, libertarians and Federalists (of which I am one) distraught about the expansion of government under "compassionate conservatism", which was really nothing more than "Big Government run by Republicans". Just like they were plenty upset with Bush and the NCLB education boondoggle.

Ahhh, ET did you read the FactCheck “clarification”? The story you quoted (by the GA R-Price, repeated twice by Fox News, and then by Murdoch’s NewsMax) had the ObamaCare cost doubling by new CBO estimates. The FactCheck pointed out the revised March 2012 CBO estimate was 8.6% higher than the CBO estimate in 2010 and 3.5% increase from that in March 2011. “Doubling" would be 100%.

And if some “tax” or “penalty” revenues are included, that is a decrease of ~0.5% from the estimate (and that is only one tax revenue enhancement).

FactCheck rightly pointed out the fallacy of the RW story as being an apples (2010-2019 partial implementation for 10 years) to grapefruit (2012-2022, full implementation 11 years) comparison - deceptive to say the least.

If you claim Obama claimed that his plan would cost less than $1T over 10 years, please provide that quote in full. I'm no fan of ObamaCare but I will point out deceptive stories.

[Sandy]

The government has a constitutional responsibility to protect its citizens, not only from military invasion, but from anything which interferes with their life, liberty, or the pursuit of their happiness.

"protect us from anything which interferes" with our life, liberty or pursuit of happiness? and double That so fundamentally flawed it's no wonder there's such a political division in this country. Government most certainly has certain responsibilities to protect us, but certainly not anything bordering on what could be conceivably be an infinite number of things that might interfere with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

So in order to supposedly protect us, government interferes with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in the name of protecting our life, liberty and pursuit of happiness? How much more convoluted can you get? Very 1984-ish.

If I desire to purchase a health insurance plan that covers X and Obama decides that all health care plans must cover X+Y and that I must pay for such a plan, he has thus interfered with my life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I now must use money to pay for something that I do not want and could have been spent on my "pursuit of happiness". I no longer have the ability to purchase plan X because Obama has decided that I should not have the liberty to do so. So if he's violating my liberty and pursuit of happiness by making me pay more for something I do not wish to buy and do not feel is necessary for my life, then by your own declaration government has violated it's constitutional responsibility.

It's not a "massive" tax...

There's a very political reason why most of the costs and regulatory burdens of Obamacare don't kick in until 2013. I would venture to guess that any cost estimates currently given about Obamacare do absolutely nothing to attempt to calculate the regulatory burden that will be placed on American businesses when the thing gets fully implemented. Nor do I imagine they calculate the cost of additional government agencies and federal employees that will be used to dictate and enforce compliance. Of course, the folks supporting this will be the loudest whiners when some American business decides it's gotten too expensive to do business over here and decides to make things elsewhere and ship them over here to sell.

I'll also predict that you'll see businesses being reluctant to hire for the next year or so until they know how screwed they're going to be by Obamacare regulations and bureaucracy.

It will also be interesting to see how many people lose their employer-paid health insurance and are dumped into these idiotic exchanges because the incentive for businesses to do so is so low. But that's another matter.

You need to read the constitution, and become familiar with its provisions. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are guarantees. I know conservatives have a really hard time understanding that, but it is fundamental to the existence and purpose of government. It has become increasingly difficult to understand the provisions of the constitution when the balance of power is tipped by the heavy hand of big money interests. The Republican party has strenuously worked to disenfranchise as many voters as they can through means that makes it difficult for those who don't have money and the power that goes with it, while at the same time opening the gates to big money interests to have their way through unlimited lobbying and unlimited PAC contributions that bypass laws passed by Congress. Health insurance is the ultimate way to profiteer, because people will pay a much higher price for the relief of pain, and extending their life than they will for consumer goods.

Of course, the folks supporting this will be the loudest whiners when some American business decides it's gotten too expensive to do business over here and decides to make things elsewhere and ship them over here to sell.

Too expensive? With the profit margins that corporate business in this country earns today? It's not "too expensive," it's blatant, immoral, sinful, evil greed, and that's the bottom line. Even Jesus, salvation, and individual souls are for sale, for a high enough price.

It's real easy to stop American business from exploiting the cheap labor of the underdeveloped countries, and keeping those people in poverty. Tax the living daylights out of companies that take their business out of the country. Offer the tax breaks and incentives to companies whose workforce is made up of 90% or higher domestic employees, and who pay a living wage. That was the crux of American "Free Market" economic thinking until post WW2. Here's the fact of the matter.

The state of instruction in the public education system in this country is fundamentally flawed. It is quite obvious we do not require enough history or civics.

[KeithE]

Who cares what word is used? In the end it boils down to a MASSIVE expansion of government interference in our lives. Whether it gets called a "tax" or a "penalty" is irrelevant to me outside of the legal word games that get played in legal proceedings.

Hey I agree with you- whether they call payment for not buying into the ACA health care offer a “tax” or a “penalty”, does not really matter. But it is expected that only about 2% will be charged with that taxpenalty (in Massachusetts only 0.3% didn’t buy) . Hardly MASSIVE . Neither is the increased 0.9% payroll tax for the wealthy or 3.8% tax on capital gains MASSIVE by any stretch of the imagination.


Story here. That would only affect at most 3% of the population and only a sliver of an increase for them. Essentially no tax increase on the Middle Class. ET, I doubt it will interfere with your life in the slightest unless you let your imagination run wild with loathing and increase your BP.

Now it is clearly possible that the health care costs will grow under ACA at the rate we have seen. After all it is the same doctors/hospitals/insurance companies/pharmaceutics that have given the growth we have seen since 1980 that will be running the show and the ACA does little to limit those costs. If true competition results from the exchanges, there might be a chance that costs will be contained, but that I doubt that since the insurance companies have explicit assurances that there will be no controls on insurance premiums as part of the “compromise” to get their ACA buy-in.

But if we could lower our medical costs by 50% as many OEDC countries have demonstrated is possible through evidence-based protocols (or just 33% as Norway [the second most expensive health care system per capita] has done), that might enhance your wallet. Think on it.

[Sandy]

That bottom chart there on your last post, Keith. Interesting. Out of all of those countries there, the US is the only one that currently has a for-profit health care system with minimum government regulation. So much for the idea that the interference of government in health care increases costs. And I see several countries there, Switzerland, Netherlands, Japan, Norway, Germany, where the quality of the health care, and availability of hospitals and medical professionals exceeds that in the US. Could it be that doing something different would lead to better care at lower cost?

[ET]

Hey I agree with you- whether they call payment for not buying into the ACA health care offer a “tax” or a “penalty”, does not really matter. But it is expected that only about 2% will be charged with that taxpenalty (in Massachusetts only 0.3% didn’t buy) . Hardly MASSIVE . Neither is the increased 0.9% payroll tax for the wealthy or 3.8% tax on capital gains MASSIVE by any stretch of the imagination.

You leave out the regulatory, hidden cost of Obamacare. You may never directly see the cost - until libs start crying over some company "shipping jobs overseas" - but a program with the regulatory burden such as this is a MASSIVE tax.

[ET]

with minimum government regulation.

MINIMUM???!!!!! REALLY, Sandy? Minimum. That's about as uniformed a statement as I've ever heard. There's a reason it takes almost a BILLION dollars and 7-10 years to bring a drug to market in this country.

You need to read the constitution, and become familiar with its provisions. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are guarantees......

I read it. I'm familiar with it. I also read what Adams, Jefferson, Madison and others wrote about the Constitution. That's why I know your position is wrong. I can carpet bomb you with quotes from such men (and the philosophers upon whom they drew wisdom) proving that your view on the Constitution is flawed, but it wouldn't do any good.

[KeithE]

That bottom chart there on your last post, Keith. Interesting. Out of all of those countries there, the US is the only one that currently has a for-profit health care system with minimum government regulation. So much for the idea that the interference of government in health care increases costs. And I see several countries there, Switzerland, Netherlands, Japan, Norway, Germany, where the quality of the health care, and availability of hospitals and medical professionals exceeds that in the US. Could it be that doing something different would lead to better care at lower cost?

That is the obvious solution and direction we should move in. ObamaCare is not making those steps. Even tax adverse conservatives should see their total health care costs reduced if we had universal health care which controlled costs instead of a system that is motivated by money and therefore opts for unneeded services/treatment (all the more to extract from the public).

You know that Medicare is a government run health care system. And it has been better at holding down the cost growth that the private systems.



More detailed comparisions here.

This notion that privatization always results in better prices is nonsense especially in the “de-regulated society” beginning in about 1980 urged on by business interests (and duped conservatives). Privatization has often been a license to a monopoly (or collusive pricing) whose purpose is to make money. Sometimes effective competition that controls costs can be arranged but in many/most cases not (especially on large programs).

Conservative would do well to cast as judgmental an eye on businesses as they do “gummint". Both need ACCOUNTABILITY not a blank check especially on big tickets and highly important items like health care. And we all can learn from the approaches taken by other countries as well as from within our borders.