Health Care Taxes

Health Care Taxes

The Patient Protection Act, as amended by the House Reconciliation Act, will fundamentally alter the health care landscape for individuals and employers. All individuals not covered by Medicaid or Medicare will be required to obtain health care coverage or pay penalties. Employer-provided coverage will generally satisfy the universal coverage requirement. Lower-income individuals, as well as some middle-class families, will receive a credit or voucher to help pay for health insurance. Employers electing not to offer qualifying coverage will be subject to an additional tax to help nonce the health care coverage for their employees. Exceptions are made for small businesses. (Bond 2008)

Individuals who currently have coverage and wish to retain that coverage can do so under a “grandfather” provision in the heath care pack-age and the coverage will be deemed to meet the individual's responsibility to have health coverage. A similar grandfather provision applies to employers that currently offer coverage. (Arrow 2006)

Individual Mandate Tax

Under the Individual Mandate Tax (IMT) provision in the bill, the part that forces you to purchase Obama care whether you want it or not, the progressive Democrats make the IRS the chief enforcer for a new government-run health insurance system. (Bond 2008)

The IRS would be in charge of verifying that every American taxpayer has obtained acceptable health coverage for every month of the year. If the IRS determines that a taxpayer lacks acceptable insurance for even a single month, then the IRS would impose a new tax on that taxpayer, even auditing the taxpayer and could assess interest and penalties on top of the tax. This is an unprecedented new role for the IRS — one that will inject the federal government even further into the lives of American families. The bill also gives the IRS some new "teeth" to strike fear in the hears of the people with, including: IRS agents verify if you have "acceptable" health care coverage. (Arrow 2006)

IRS has the authority to fine you up to $2,250 or 2 percent of your income (whichever is greater) for failure to prove that you have purchased "minimum essential coverage" IRS can confiscate your tax refund IRS audits are likely to increase IRS will need up to $10 billion to administer the new health care program this decade IRS may need to hire as many as 16,500 additional auditors, agents and other employees to investigate and collect billions in new taxes from ...