Proponents of the health care reform bills currently under consideration in Congress claim that the cost of insuring the uninsured will be paid for by taxes on the rich, and by employers, who will be required to shoulder “responsibility” for their employee’s health insurance. The reality is that these provisions will act as an extremely regressive tax on the working poor, substantially reducing their take-home pay and in some cases eliminating their jobs altogether. All the House and Senate drafts of health care reform include so-called “employer mandates” or “pay …
Senators Max Baucus and Charles Grassley, the Chairman and Ranking Member respectively of the powerful Senate Committee on Finance have just delivered an indictment of the current health care system, including, strangely enough, the traditional Medicare program that top liberal health policy analysts and many in Congress want to use as the model of a new public health plan. The Baucus/Grassley policy options on Transforming the Health Care Delivery System: Proposals to Improve Patient Care and Reduce Health Care Costs shows: Senator Baucus agrees with conservative policy analysts. Including those …
