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Dead Constitution See other Dead Constitution Articles Title: Reid Seeks MedicareTax on Capital Gains to Fund Health Bill Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid may seek to apply Medicare taxes to capital gains earned by wealthy Americans as part of health-overhaul legislation in order to scale back a proposed levy on high-end insurance plans, two congressional aides said. Speaking on condition of anonymity, they said Reid’s aides have sought input on the idea from staffers for senators such as Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, a Democrat, and Olympia Snowe of Maine, the only Republican senator to vote for the legislation. Reid’s proposal, being advanced by Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, would apply Medicare taxes to non-wage income earned from capital gains, dividends, interest, royalties, and partnerships for American couples earning more than $250,000, the aides said. He’s also considering an alternative that would simply increase the 1.45 percent Medicare tax on salaries of couples who earn more than $250,000, one of the aides said. Either approach would let Reid scale back a 40 percent excise tax on so-called Cadillac health benefits. Critics say that tax would hurt rank-and-file workers and violate President Barack Obama’s pledge to not raise taxes on couples earning less than $250,000. A proposal adopted by the Senate Finance Committee would generally apply the tax to family benefits worth more than $21,000. ‘Millionaire’s Tax’ Lawmakers are trying to craft a bill to cover tens of millions of uninsured Americans while curbing medical costs. Their proposals for new purchasing exchanges, subsidies and a requirement that all Americans have insurance would cost more than $800 billion over 10 years and represent the biggest changes to U.S. health care in four decades. The Medicare tax proposal would seek to circumvent Senate opposition to a House plan to impose a 5.4 percent income surtax on individuals earning more than $500,000. That levy has been labeled a “millionaire’s tax” because it wouldn’t apply to couples until they have earned more than $1 million. “This would mean a significant shift on the part of Senate leadership,” said Alan Charney, program director for USAction, a Washington-based advocacy group whose board includes officials from labor unions. “It would move the Senate leadership closer to the House” and ask “the very wealthiest Americans who have enjoyed tax cut after tax cut over the past eight years to pay their fair share.” Senators’ Demands An increased Medicare tax would also address demands by some senators including Snowe and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus that the bill raise taxes only in health- related areas. The House income-surtax plan would raise about $461 billion in revenue through 2019 to help fund health care, according to an official estimate by the nonpartisan congressional Joint Committee on Taxation. The proposed Senate tax on Cadillac plans would generate $201 billion over the same period. The proposal to apply Medicare taxes to non-wage income is modeled after a plan in July by the Washington research group Citizens for Tax Justice and was briefly considered by the Senate Finance Committee. Citizens for Tax Justice proposed a variety of approaches, including subjecting all forms of income to the current 1.45 percent levy, and increasing the rate to 2.5 percent for Americans who earn more than $200,000 a year, while exempting most senior citizens’ investment income. That proposal would raise $500 billion over 10 years, according to the group. Medicare Tax Medicare, a government-operated insurance program for the elderly, is funded by a 2.9 percent hospital insurance payroll tax. Half is paid by the worker, half by the employer. There is no cap on wages subject to the levy. Jim Manley, a spokesman for Reid, declined to comment on the Medicare tax proposal. “No decisions have been made,” he said. Conrad spokesman Steve Posner and Snowe spokeswoman Julia Wanzco didn’t immediately answer questions. Kerry spokeswoman Whitney Smith didn’t immediately respond to questions. House lawmakers briefly considered increasing or expanding the Medicare tax, a House staffer said. The idea was rejected because lawmakers concluded they may need to increase the payroll tax in the future to pay Medicare benefits that are projected to outpace revenue, the aide said. Business Report As Congress works to find consensus on legislation, the Business Roundtable today urged adoption of a health-care overhaul that meets its goals. The group, which says its member companies provide health coverage to more than 35 million Americans, released a report showing that “effective reforms” could slow health-care costs by as much as $3,000 per employee by 2019. Still, the report raised concerns about critical aspects of the pending legislation, including a government-run health insurance program, or public option. The report also concluded that any bill must have a strong requirement that all Americans get insurance. The Senate Finance Committee scaled back penalties for failure to get coverage in its version. “Reform done wrong won’t work and could make a bad situation much worse, in which case Business Roundtable could not support the bill,” Eastman Kodak Co. Chief Executive Officer Antonio Perez, chairman of the Washington-based group’s consumer health and retirement initiative, said in a statement. The group said it would work with Congress and the White House to improve the legislation. In addition to the Rochester, New York-based photography equipment company led by Perez, the group’s members include New York-based drugmaker Pfizer Inc. and health insurer Aetna Inc., based in Hartford, Connecticut. The report “makes clear the steep price that American businesses stand to pay if we fail to act,” Obama said in a statement. “The potential benefit for America’s businesses is just another reason why we can’t afford delay or political games as this process moves forward.”
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#1. To: DeaconBenjamin (#0)
How about a Military-Industrial Complex excise tax on all Americans, of whatever income level, who have ever cheered on the perpetual wars? This would hit the ones who want the wars and make them pay for them.
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