tailieunhanh - The Baucus Individual Health Insurance Mandate: Taxing Low-Income and Moderate-Income Workers

Another broad-based farm organization, the National Farmers Union (NFU), contends that crop insurance remains inadequate for those with multi-year disasters, and that crop quality loss discounts applied in insurance contracts do not reflect realities of the marketplace. The organization also wants insurance companies to offer coverage in all areas and not “cherry pick” regions that are most profitable, a concern that USDA attempted to address in the Standard Reinsurance Agreement signed in 2010. Finally, the organization requests a revised auditing procedure that could avoid duplicative reviews of records. Currently, RMA requires an automatic review if a farmer receives an indemnity. | Backmxindcr Pl irJierwvT nv I np Wprrif-ncft PX1 irtrtcrHrvn No. 2325 September 25 2009 M Published by The Heritage Foundation The Baucus Individual Health Insurance Mandate Taxing Low-Income and Moderate-Income Workers Robert A. Book . Guinevere Nell and Paul L. Winfree Abstract The individual mandate in the Baucus health care plan would impose punitively high regressive taxes on low-income and moderate-income working families. Its penalties and additional taxes on business would discourage companies from hiring or continuing to employ low-income and moderate-income workers. The plan would substantially raise health insurance premiums. Yet the plan would still leave millions of Americans without access to affordable health insurance. Adding to their misfortune it would then punish them with a tax penalty precisely because they are uninsured. A key component of the health care plan released by Senator Max Baucus D-MT on September 16 is its individual mandate a legal requirement that nearly every American obtain health insurance or face substantial tax penalties. The mandate would be implemented through new requirements for employers a new system of statebased health insurance exchanges and the IRS which will impose tax penalties on the uninsured and share personal financial data with employers and health insurance companies. While making health coverage available to all Americans is an admirable goal the structure of this particular mandate severely restricts customer choice and imposes a punitive and regressive financial burden on those with the least ability to pay. In effect the Baucus plan would tell the working poor If you have been choosing between food and health insur- Talking Points The Baucus health care plan would impose punitively high regressive taxes on low-income and moderate-income working families substantially increase health insurance premiums and impose financial penalties on those who cannot afford insurance. Penalties and additional taxes