Some Absurdities of the Obamacare Decision
From the Democrats: A massive new tax on those least able to pay.
June 28, 2012 - 7:55 am
Here’s a couple, and I suspect this post will grow:
First, as far as I can tell, while this said Congress was limited under the Commerce Act, you can get the same effect through power of taxation. In other words, they can’t make you buy broccoli, but they can tax you for not buying broccoli.
Second, while the Left is crowing about Obamacare surviving, the mandate survives as a tax. As a tax, since it applies to everyone equally, and is most likely to hit low-paid workers since they are least likely to have insurance. That means the Democratic Congress passed, and Obama signed, a massive new tax on those least able to pay.
It’s a farce. If it’s a tax, then the Anti-injunction Act applies. If the AIA doesn’t apply then it’s not a tax. And I’m now going to be taxed for not buying a Government Motors Volt?
I can now sell my Monty Python dvds, they aren’t as absurd as reality now.
If I understand Roberts’ ruling, he’s saying “since you didn’t say it’s a tax, we didn’t know it wasn’t a tax and so the Anti-Injunction Act doesn’t apply, and we have to take it as ripe for judgement. Then we looked under the covers and surprise, it IS a tax.”
In other words, by claiming it wasn’t a tax, they were too clever by half and made it possible to decide now.
You’re already being taxed for not buying a Chevy Volt also.
But they didn’t pass a massive new tax on those least able to afford it. Aren’t most who currently have no health insurance going to get it bought for them? Government will pay the premiums. It’s the rest of us (I don’t have any insurance, owing to the nature of my job) who are getting stuck with a new tax. I will most likely have to buy insurance with all kinds of goodies that I don’t need or want. I’m considering drastically reducing my withholding tax to ensure that the IRS can’t get its grubby hands on my funds.
The Supreme Court has made its ruling. Now let THEM enforce it.
Does the law say anything about how the tax (penalty) would be administered? How much? What determines the amount? Also, if the Senate version of the ACA was the one approved, how can it be a tax? Taxes can’t originate in the Senate, right?
Questions……….
Sam, on where it originated, you may recall that the bill was inserted into a House Bill under reconciliation that had already arrived in the Senate: they, by amendment, removed the whole text of that bill and inserted their own. That’s how they figleafed the requirement for spending bills to originate in the House, as well as qualifying it to be passed with only 51 votes.
Here are some tax amounts for non-compliance. There are additional taxes on income and investment income that has nothing to do with the mandate.
For businesses with over 50 employees, it tends to be about $2,000 per employee which is a lot less than the cost of a full service premium, the only form of insurance acceptable by the IRS.
http://www.obamacarewatch.org/primer/employer-mandate
http://www.nfib.com/Portals/0/PDF/AllUsers/Free%20Rider%20Provision.pdf
Of course, a company can minimize this tax by not hiring. And I think it will be hard to raise this tax enough to discourage companies from dropping ever more costly insurance premiums with a strong Republican presence in congress.
WRT to individuals:
http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/understanding-health-care-law-obamacare-disaster
“… The penalty for not complying with the individual mandate is $695 per person in a family, up to a maximum of $2,085 a year. That applies to everyone regardless of income. These new taxes violate candidate Obama’s pledge in 2008 not to raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 per year…”
Um. Confused. It’s not that just non-broccoli eaters or those who don’t buy broccoli are taxed, it’s that everybody who breathes is taxed for broccoli, right?
I’ve got a small company with only a couple of employees. If O gets re-elected, it’s very tempting to just pay or reimburse the guys for their fines and let everyone use government healthcare to take care of them. It costs me almost $7,000 a year per employee for healthcare. I’m going to save a hell of a lot of money.
Just how will the “tax” be collected from those people working for undeclared cash? (Illegal immigrants come to mind.) Will medical services still be given to them along with legal papers demanding a tax audit? How many extra IRS agents will the government need to hire?