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GLENN: We may not recover from healthcare: So let's get down to the stats because they are throwing all kinds of stats around. Congressional Budget Office, the Kennedy healthcare bill, that should be your first tip off this is a bad idea.
The stats that are being thrown around are so bad, the Obama administration is now distancing itself from the bill saying it's not the president's bill, which nothing is ever this president's, ever. Have you ever noticed that? Nothing. There's no such thing as the president's bill. He just signs them. "Well, it was the only thing, I mean, I'm just it's the only thing that was presented to me." Here's what the bill does. It adds $1 trillion to our debt. That's not the cost. It adds $1 trillion to our debt and still will not come even remotely close to insuring everyone. After all of the spending plus $1 trillion in debt, how many people will still be uninsured?
Now, think about it. We're trying to make sure that we've covered all 45 million Americans that don't have healthcare. $1 trillion in debt and all the spending and all the hassle to you and everything else. How many people are still uninsured? According to the plan that is not the president's plan, 37 million still uninsured. But there's more in this bill that you're not hearing about.
For instance, 58% of the bill's effects will serve to move people from their current insurance to a new fancy government subsidize exchange. 58%. Where does the bulk of the money go? Quote: The federal government would subsidize the purchase of health insurance through those exchanges for individuals and families with incomes between 150% and 500% of the federal poverty level. These subsidies would represent the greatest single component of the proposal's cost.
So let's now see what this really means. Take a family of four. If you make between $33,000 and $110,000 a year, the government is going to pay for some of your healthcare insurance and it will be on a sliding scale. A lot of Republicans will say, "Oh, the Democrats want to pay for your health insurance up to $110,000 a year," but that's not true. There is no limit. It's based on family size. For example, you are going to be paying for octomom's health insurance even if octomom pulls in $203,000. You will be paying for octomom's family. As long as Jon and Kate plus 8 remain Jon and Kate plus 8, you are on the hook even if they make over $220,000. But wait, there's more. What about all of the people that make less than $33,000 a year? This if you are driving, pull over to the side of the road. No, I'm going to give you time because you might you may have an aneurysm. You could kill people and they might be uninsured! Have you pulled over yet? This is going to blow your mind. What about the people making less than $33,000 a year? They are not covered! Quote: Expanded eligibility for the Medicaid program may be added at a later date. A significant expansion of Medicaid would have an effect both on the federal budget and on the extent of insurance coverage. Translation: This trillion dollars of debt thing, everybody's worked up about a trillion, it's only dealing with the people who are relatively well off. It's not even accounting for a major expansion of Medicaid, which is coming. I mean, unless you think Barack Obama and Ted Kennedy are going to sign a healthcare plan that helps the wealthy and not the poor. I'm just saying.
So here's where it gets really good. We've helped the relatively well off. We're not helping the poor at all. And how do we pay for it? Are you still pulled over? The cost would be partly offset by... receipts, or savings, from three sources. In other words, receipts, receipts, receipts, what do you mean receipts? Oh, taxes or penalties. One: Increases in tax revenues who are you going to hit? Who are you going to hit? Increases in tax revenues stemming from the decline in employment based coverage. Wait a minute. What's that? Two: Payments of penalties by uninsured individuals. Penalties? What? And three: Reductions in outlays for Medicare and CHIP I'm sorry, Medicaid. So let's look at these one by one. First two are the easiest. Reductions in Medicaid and CHIP. Some of these people are going to be moving from Medicaid to other parts of the plan. So the savings are not really savings. It's a recordkeeping thing. It's not new people we're paying for. It's old people under a new plan. So it's not paying for them. It's just moving where you send the check. There's no savings there. There's savings in one pocket, but we move the people to the other pocket.
Next, the payments of penalties by uninsured individuals. This is where it gets good. If you don't have insurance, you are going to pay a penalty to the government. They are going to use that money to pay for some of the free and subsidized healthcare that they are giving out to other people. Now, how many people are going to pay that penalty? How stiff is that penalty? If it's really stiff, I would imagine you are only going to miss it once. How long does that penalty last? I mean, how many times you can't make an example out of people because that's a revenue source! What are you going to charge them? $10? Because you need them to keep violating it because you need the next $10 the next week. So unlike our current system that's supposedly so terrible, the uninsured will now pay to insure other uninsured people. Got it? Now, who has to pay? And who has to tell you what you pay? Well, if you are uninsured, you pay. You are going to love this. Quote: The proposal will also impose a financial cost on most people... most people, not all people... most people who do not obtain insurance, the size of which would be set by the secretary of the treasury. No insurance? Here is TurboTax Geithner.
Now, if that sounds like the worst part, it isn't. The one way they get more money to pay for free healthcare is by reclaiming the tax breaks you are currently getting on insurance. That was number one. The way it works now is your company gets a tax break if they give you insurance. So, so many people who they claim this isn't going to happen. This is not going to hurt people's insurance that they already have. You got good insurance at work? Don't worry about it; you're not going to but since they are projecting that so many people are going to be getting rid of their workplace insurance, the money's not going to be tax free anymore. The CBO also assumes that companies will basically give you all the money that they used to spend on healthcare as additional wages.
So in other words, you don't get healthcare, the company says, "Well, I ain't supplying it anymore; get it from the government." The government is just assuming once they finish taxing the rich and the businesses in other areas that they are just going to take that money that they had been spending on healthcare and just give it to you. They just, "I don't know what I'm going to do with that extra five grand. What do I do with it? I'll just give it to John," who's now getting his free healthcare benefit from the government. Why would a company invest that in the company? Why would the company take that money and try to offset some of the extra costs that the company has incurred in other areas because of taxes? So all of the additional, all of the money that the company has saved from giving their healthcare to the government is now going to be taxed.
Can I ask you a question? Since when did we believe in the good of companies? How suddenly refreshing from the Democrats and Barack Obama. So if a company used to spend $3,000 on insurance with a tax break, it becomes $3,000 in your pocket which they get taxed on. Then you have to buy insurance with that money if the company gives you that money. That doesn't sound like a tax hike to me, does it? Does it sound like a tax hike to you? I mean, I know that's not how the Democrats categorize it as a tax hike. How do tax hikes not come in combination with this?
