This is a lie that Barack "World" Obama keeps repeating. John McCain has a tax credit plan to help people get health insurance themselves--a tax cut for almost all people who either have health insurance, or go out and buy it. The Brookings Institute, and another liberal think tank, analyzed the McCain plan and so stated. Indeed, the liberal think tanks estimated (trying, I think, to help Obama) that McCain's tax cut (mainly for "middle income" and lower income people) would amount to 1.3 trillion dollars (over a period of years). The Obama plan for government expenditures is estimated (probably underestimated) at 1.6 trillion dollars.
Obama keeps calling McCain's tax cut a tax increase. McCain needs to start calling Obama a liar on this (frimly, even if he does not use that word). Obama is a liar on this. As I said in an earlier entry, even the leftist, and dumb, AP said so (using the word "misleading").
Obama has an ad running in El Paso, Texas (where I live) deliberately putting out this lie. The ad says that McCain's plan would tax health insurance benefits "for the first time in American history" (false in itself, although not the main falsehood). That is fundametally false--a lie.
McCain's health care plan is a net tax cut for just about everyone (in practice, it will probably be a tax cut for absolutely everyone, by the time it all shakes out). McCain also proposes "taking away" the $3500.00 individual deduction for children, but replacing it with a $7000.00 deduction (double). Obama could just as accurately say that McCina is taking away the $3500.00 deduction, if he fails to mention that McCain is replacing it with double the deductioin (a tax cut).
That is what McCain is doing with health insurance. He is requiring it be reported as income (which it is not, if it is employer provided, under current law). However, McCain is replacing that tax benefit with a benefit that will be more than double, for most families (who are not the "rich"--who Obama is promising to tax wtihout mercy). I have given this example before. Assume you have a family with $30,000 taxable income and $10,000 in health insurance provided by an employer. That family is in a 15% tax bracket. Under present law they will pay $4500.00 in taxes (15% of $30,000). Under McCain's proposal, they will report $40,000 in income (adding in the $10,000), but will pay income taxes of only $1000.00 (you first figure the 15% of $40,000, but then you deduct the offsetting McCain tax credit of $5,000.00) This is a TAX CUT of $3500.00, or about 75%.
Further, the tax credit will surely result in a check being paid to lower income people to reimburse them for health insurance--a check representing money they are not getting under the present tax law.
Is it really true that present law does not tax health insurance benefits? Not exactly (historically, I think it is even more of a lie, but I don't think it is worth going into history, since this is not the Big Lie here).
Some people buy individual health insurance. They pay for that insurance with pre-tax dollars. In other words, they are taxed on the health insurance benefit they provide themselves. Now they may get a DEDUCTION for what they pay, but that deduction (for middle income people) will be less than McCain's tax credit (the tax credit being more valuable than a deduction). This is the real purpose of McCain's health care plan--to enable people to choose their own individual health insurance--not only enabling them to afford it but to choose the type of insurance they want. The idea (good luck) is to encourage competition in price by encouraging people to purchase their own health insurance (which will be mainly paid for by the Federal Government with the tax credit--hence the 1.3 trillion dollar "cost"). the present law is actually unfair, since if your employer does not provide health insurance, you have to buy it on your own with pre-tax collars (having to rely on whatever deduction the government may give you--less valuable than a credit) while corporation provided health insurance is not taxed. Just how bad this discrimination is has varied over the years. McCain would treat employer provided and individually purchased health insurance exactly the same--eliminating the discrimination--which is the correct economic way to do it. McCain will also give that net tax cut. It is absurd (a lie) for Obama to run the ad he is running in El Paso (and I am sure elsewhere).
The ad (the lies just never end) goes on to say that that "millions" of Americans will pay higher taxes. This is a lie, under any reasonable construction of the ad. Yes, there is a way for a person to pay higher taxes under McCain's plan. That is if the person is RICH. The person has to be in the highest tax bracket, AND have extremely expensive health insurance. Remember how Obama says 95% of Americans will get a tax cut under his tax plan. Well, probably 99% of all Americans will get a net tax cut under McCain's health care plan. Further, they can all arrange their health care coverage to not pay any additional taxes. Every person in the 15% tax bracket (or 0 tax bracket) will receive a tax cut of DOUBLE or more their present tax benefit. But the "rich" may pay a very small additional tax, if they have a very expensive health care plan in addition to being in the top tax bracket. That will be very few people (in percentage terms), and they all can avoid it by adjusting their health insurance plan. This is actually not a problem unless health insurance keeps going up, and the highest tax bracket keeps going up (Obama's 50%, for example). Then, in the future, more people (still not the ""middle class") might end up with a higher tax. I would expect the law to be changed before that happens in a major way--even to higher bracket taxpayers. McCain's plan is designed to try to slow down the rise in health insurance costs, and medical costs. Maybe it will. Don't count on it, but it surely has a better chance than the government dominated plan of Obama.
Missouri is where Obama supporting prosecutors seemed to threaten to prosecute people for lying in campaign ads. That raises the question: Will people in the Obama campaign go to jail in Missouri. More realistically, since the Obama supporters backed off of this threat (saying they never meant that), Can I complain about the license of TV stations in El Paso that are running this lying (obviously false and misleading) Obama ad?
Yes, the Obama campaign did this one as a deliberate Obama campaign tactic, and even tried to defend it on national television. They sent letters to TV stations threatening to challenge the license of TV stations who ran "false" ads about Obama--ads not nearly as false as the Obama ad to which I am referring. AsI have repeatedly said, leftists do not believe in free speech. They are perfectly willing to try to impose a "chilling effect" on free speech for political purposes. As I have also said, I don't believe in turning the other cheek. So while I do believe in free speech, and would never have thought of this on my own, the Obama campaign should not be surprised if I--as a private citizen never connected with the McCain campaign and not even supporting McCain--send an "Obama leetter" to El Paso TV stations.
P.S. I do get to see "battleground" state type ads in El Paso. That is because El Paso is geographically more a part of New Mexico (a battleground state) than it is part of Texas. Of course, people in El Paso cannot vote in New Mexico, unless registered by ACORN or La Raza or some other leftist voter fraud group. But El Paso TV goes into New Mexico--especially Las Cruces and other areas nearer El Paso than any New Mexico city. For example, I went to high school in Silver City, and El Paso TV stations were the main stations we could get (although not always good reception). Cable TV and satellite have changed things, but New Mexico candidates still advertise on El Paso broadcast media. I saw this lying Obama ad on the Fox affiliate in El Paso while I was watching that Dallas Cowboy game (the subject of my Sunday entry on the realtionship of ACORN and the recent poor performance of Tony Romo).
No comments:
Post a Comment