Long live Obamacare
07-05-2012, 04:59 PM
#243
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So this sounds like a tax on "Cadillac" health insurance plans, which are tax deductible to the employer and sometimes used as a non-salary or non-commission based form of compensation. Does that sound right?
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07-05-2012, 05:09 PM
#245
My Dads solution to health insurance is to not have any. Instead he puts the money he would spend on healthcare into a million dollar life insurance policy and is counting on kicking the bucket before he is 65~70. If he ends up in the hospital they cant refuse him healthcare because he doesn't have insurance. Playin' the system while he still can.
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07-06-2012, 09:31 AM
#246
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Isn't that one of the "conservative" ideas? Reduce the reliance/favoritism on employer-sponsored health insurance plans and provide for more transparent compensation? i.e. Close/shrink a tax code "loophole" and simplify taxation?
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07-06-2012, 10:52 AM
#247
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i dunno. I thought was just a tax on people receiving badass health care plans from employers, like well paid CEOs.
But IIRC, I remember reading something about high level union leaders being able to keep "cadalliac" health care plans without being levied an excise tax.
I believe the tax gets levied against the employer as well, so it's going to discourage employers from offering to pay over $10,000 a year for employees health care plans.
I do realize the more employers pay on health care the less the have to pay in taxes, so wouldn't the best way to remove "loopholes" (which are perfectly legal and written as laww) would be not to tax something else to discourage a company from paying a tax, but to i dunno, remove the "loophole?"
I honestly don't see how this tax does anything but hurt the people/compaines that can afford to give their employees awesome coverage and do little else to benefit anything/one else.
But IIRC, I remember reading something about high level union leaders being able to keep "cadalliac" health care plans without being levied an excise tax.
I believe the tax gets levied against the employer as well, so it's going to discourage employers from offering to pay over $10,000 a year for employees health care plans.
I do realize the more employers pay on health care the less the have to pay in taxes, so wouldn't the best way to remove "loopholes" (which are perfectly legal and written as laww) would be not to tax something else to discourage a company from paying a tax, but to i dunno, remove the "loophole?"
I honestly don't see how this tax does anything but hurt the people/compaines that can afford to give their employees awesome coverage and do little else to benefit anything/one else.
Last edited by Braineack; 07-06-2012 at 11:05 AM.
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07-09-2012, 02:09 PM
#248
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alternative: accident insurance - to cover health related expenses related to non-recurring injuries. Car accident? Badly sprained ankle? it's covered. pre-existing condition? chronic illness? not covered under base insurance. This protects people from bankruptcy in the event of a significant unexpected event. I propose that the threat of bankruptcy is the #1 reason that HSAs haven't caught on in this country like wildfire.
You want to be insured for those other things? That's where you start adding (and paying for) additional options to your plan.
If HSAs become a popular method for paying for health related expenses, price information will naturally become more perfect, as doctors begin to post prices for common procedures in order to show how much money you can save by going to doctor A vs. doctor B. If that happens, "fraudulent prices" (where a doctor will charge 2,000 for a procedure, but the insurance company determines he's only going to get 400) will go away, and doctors will begin by charging 400 for the procedure instead of 2000. Soon, docs will be charging 375, and 350, and 325 just to try to get more patients...
...lastly, when people start paying for their own routine health expenses, the demand for doctors will fall sharply - I'm certainly not going to go see a doctor for the common cold - or an ankle sprain... as the demand falls for doctors, we'll have another sharp decrease in pricing. Too many doctors with too few patients, and they're going to start marginalizing their own profits just to stay in business. You'll probably have doctors offices issuing out their own loyalty cards - "visit us 3 times, and the 4th visit is free!" - or providing incentives - "free cholesterol checkup with any doctor visit!"
IMO, modern day doctors should be vilified based on how much profit a decently sized practice can make. They're on about the same level as teacher's unions and homeowner's associations as far as I'm concerned.
You want to be insured for those other things? That's where you start adding (and paying for) additional options to your plan.
If HSAs become a popular method for paying for health related expenses, price information will naturally become more perfect, as doctors begin to post prices for common procedures in order to show how much money you can save by going to doctor A vs. doctor B. If that happens, "fraudulent prices" (where a doctor will charge 2,000 for a procedure, but the insurance company determines he's only going to get 400) will go away, and doctors will begin by charging 400 for the procedure instead of 2000. Soon, docs will be charging 375, and 350, and 325 just to try to get more patients...
...lastly, when people start paying for their own routine health expenses, the demand for doctors will fall sharply - I'm certainly not going to go see a doctor for the common cold - or an ankle sprain... as the demand falls for doctors, we'll have another sharp decrease in pricing. Too many doctors with too few patients, and they're going to start marginalizing their own profits just to stay in business. You'll probably have doctors offices issuing out their own loyalty cards - "visit us 3 times, and the 4th visit is free!" - or providing incentives - "free cholesterol checkup with any doctor visit!"
IMO, modern day doctors should be vilified based on how much profit a decently sized practice can make. They're on about the same level as teacher's unions and homeowner's associations as far as I'm concerned.
i have to disagree with you on vilifying doctors though. i realize that healthcare is very expensive but a rather large chunk of what you are paying is because of malpractice insurance. it is ungodly expensive and they pass the cost onto the customer. also...medicare and medicaid drive up the cost of healthcare. by law the doc has to charge regular patients no less than he charges medicare and medicaid patients, in essence the government is price fixing healthcare costs.
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07-09-2012, 02:43 PM
#251
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and nobody is stopping it because the population has grown stupid. most of the public has little knowledge of the constitution and the bill of rights, no one wants to go up against the government machine in fear of retribution. not to mention in our politically correct world you would be labelled a racist, bigot, woman and child hater by the lefties.
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07-09-2012, 03:03 PM
#253
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it is only partially correct. numbers-wise that makes sense. what is important here is that scotus has now made a precedence in allowing the government to use tax as a punishment and or as a way of coercing citizens into complying with an unconstitutional law. notice that in the wording of the law they never called it a tax, they called it a fine, it was scotus who said it could be construed as a tax.
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07-09-2012, 03:17 PM
#259
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its a game, that's all, its all in the interpretation. when they called the mandate a tax it was like saying the government is not forcing you to buy the insurance and therefore not be in violation of interstate commerce law...
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