HEALTH CARE PLANS WOULD COST TAXPAYERS, DRIVE UP DEFICIT
Guest post by Sean Mahoney
During a tele-town hall meeting this week, Rep. Paul Hodes discussed his support for a trillion-plus dollar health care reform package with his constituents. “We’ve got to lower costs for everybody,” he said. Who does he think he’s kidding? If we “lower costs for everyone,” where exactly is the trillion dollars going to come from?
As the massive stimulus act has shown, a trillion dollars doesn’t suddenly appear because Congress appropriates it. It comes in the form of higher taxes on small businesses, families and, in order to cover the crippling debt, our grandchildren.
There is no doubt the existing U.S. health care system is in financial trouble and in need of significant reform. Each year, America spends over $2.4 trillion on health care, significantly more than any other nation. At the same time, more than 47 million citizens are uninsured and, as a nation, we forgo over a trillion dollars a year in productivity due to illness. This is unsustainable.
Unfortunately, the measures offered by President Barack Obama and the Democratic majority in Washington increase taxes and the federal budget deficit, diminish our control over our health care choices, fail to improve the quality of our health care and will force many Americans who are presently satisfied with their health coverage out of their private plans and into a government plan.
President Obama has said he will not sign a bill that increases the deficit. Therefore, every new cent of spending in the health reform bill must be paid for with new taxes. Good luck. We are in the worst economic conditions since the 1930s. American small businesses can little afford the 8% payroll tax penalty the Democrats would levy against them if they can’t afford to provide insurance to their employees. Nor can the so-called rich be squeezed for any more than the Obama administration has already appropriated from them to finance his failed stimulus act. Many of the “wealthy” individuals on whose wallets the Democrats set their sights are actually small business owners and entrepreneurs; the very same job creators who need to succeed financially if we are to climb out of the recession. The last thing our struggling economy needs now is an additional trillion dollars in new taxes.
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