[marclove]

Nice try, but the the excise tax on "premium" plans doesn't go into effect until 2018. So if their only motivation was taxes, they'd have waited.

Furthermore, I'm not losing any sleep about the government taxing only the portion of the value of a health plan that exceeds $27,500/yr -- in other words, the first $27,500 remains tax-free -- when the average employer-sponsored health plan is valued at $13,375/yr (2009). And here's what a $20,400/yr plan looks like:

For the secretaries and environmental engineers, game wardens and van drivers who work for the state of New Hampshire, surgery is free, even at Boston’s top teaching hospitals if it’s necessary. So are MRIs, CT scans, and X-rays.

Pregnant women pay nothing for prenatal care; alcoholics aren’t billed for short stints in rehab. Seeing a therapist costs just $10, as many as 20 visits a year, and prescription drugs top out at $30 for a three-month mail-order supply. New Hampshire state employees get $450 annually toward gym memberships, if they go regularly, or $200 toward their own treadmill - and there’s a $150 annual reimbursement for yoga classes, diabetes clinics, and nutritional counseling.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2009/0...

Yea, cry me a river if well-paid employees now have to buy their own treadmills or pay for their own rehab.

[larrywright]

So if a company (or state government in your example) wants to provide health care benefits to be competitive in the marketplace, they should be penalized for that?

Additionally, your statement about "well-paid employees" doesn't seem to fit with the article you quoted. Secretaries and van drivers aren't generally highly paid positions.

[marclove]

So if a company (or state government in your example) wants to provide health care benefits to be competitive in the marketplace, they should be penalized for that?

I don't accept your premise that taxes = penalization.

Employers who pay their employees $35,000/yr have to pay more in federal taxes than if they paid their employees $34,000/yr. I don't consider that a penalty either. Its progressive taxation.

Additionally, your statement about "well-paid employees" doesn't seem to fit with the article you quoted. Secretaries and van drivers aren't generally highly paid positions.

"Well-paid employees" referred to Microsoft employees.

The government positions (secretaries & van drivers) mentioned in the article, I would agree, probably aren't highly paid. They have a great health plan because of the unions that represent them and fight for those benefits. If they were non-union, they'd probably have much crappier health plan options.

But as the article said, the value of their plan is $20,400/yr. The excise tax is on whatever amount exceeds $27,500/yr. So they, and the state government they work for, will not be subject to any new taxes under the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

The reason I quoted the article was to show how great a $20,400/yr health plan is. Just imagine the benefits you'd get from a $27,500+/yr health plan. The people who have plans that expensive, most of them executives and other highly paid employees, are not hurting and I could care less if they have to go with a slightly less lavish plan that doesn't cover things like rehab, treadmills and gym memberships or choose to pay what amounts to income taxes on the portion that exceeds $27,500/yr.

[d2viant]

I don't accept your premise that taxes = penalization.

Employers who pay their employees $35,000/yr have to pay more in federal taxes than if they paid their employees $34,000/yr. I don't consider that a penalty either. Its progressive taxation.

The two aren't mutually exclusive. Just because it's called "progressive taxation" doesn't mean it isn't penalizing. I consider any tax at all penalizing. It's the exact reason politicians raise taxes when they want to discourage certain activities or lower them when they want to encourage more of a certain activity.

[marclove]

I consider any tax at all penalizing.

Heh, so all taxes should be abolished because the government shouldn't be penalizing us for making money, right?

[d2viant]

I suppose if your goal was to let people keep as much money as possible, then sure -- don't tax them on anything. However, voters have accepted a certain amount of self-inflicted pain in exchange for services that the private sector can't or won't provide. However, generally speaking I don't believe the government is a particularly efficient means of reallocating society's capital, I'd rather give entrepreneurs in the private sector the chance to do it better.

[marclove]

Yea, those crazy voters...engaging in a little self-masochism because they want things like police officers, firefighters, armed forces, potable water, roads, education, and social security.

In general, I agree that the private sector can do better than the government in many areas. The problem is, when it comes to health care coverage they haven't, not when the #1 cause of bankruptcy in the United States is medical bills.

Furthermore, entrepreneurs still have the chance to do it better. Nothing in the health reform bill prevents them from doing so. So if you think you can do better d2viant, more power to ya. There are tens of millions of Americans with no health care coverage who are waiting for your better & more efficient solution.

[d2viant]

It doesn't matter that the tax takes effect in 2018. The "premium" plans are increasing their costs as soon as next year in anticipation of that eventual reality. Companies which have open enrollment coming up soon are seeing these increased costs and dropping plans or reevaluating the type of coverage they offer.

[marclove]

Hilarious...

Fact #1: The only increase in cost for "premium plans" is the new excise tax which doesn't go into effect until 2018.

Fact #2: The companies who provide these benefits will have to pay the taxes, not the insurance companies.

Fact #3: Since the insurance companies are not paying any new taxes on the "premium plans", any rate increases cannot be blamed on taxes they will never be required to pay.

This is, in effect, a payroll tax on benefits provided as compensation to employees. But only the value of the plan that exceeds $27,500 is taxed. So if the plan costs $28,000/yr, they will be taxed on a whopping $500 of the plan.

$27,500 is more than twice what the average employees' employer-provided health plan is worth. So yea, I don't think there's anything unreasonable about taxing whatever exceeds that amount.

Health insurance companies have been raising premiums at ridiculous rates and finding excuses to avoid providing coverage for decades now. I find it hilarious that people are now trying to blame it on a bill that was just passed this year. They only dislike the bill because they dislike who's responsible for passing it.