Democrats: GOP Medicaid reform plan is really about tax cuts

[DonViejo]

Source: Associated Press



SATURDAY, FEB 25, 2017 02:30 PM EST

BEN NUCKOLS, ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic governors say a proposal by their Republican counterparts to overhaul Medicaid is really just a smoke screen for tax cuts for the wealthy.

GOP governors intend to present Congress with a plan they say would give states more flexibility to administer health coverage for poorer residents. The Republican proposal is also meant to protect states from absorbing the costs of repealing the Affordable Care Act.

Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington and other Democratic governors said Saturday that the GOP plan won’t improve health care for anyone. He says it’s really meant to cut spending on Medicaid to finance tax cuts.

Inslee says a repeal of President Barack Obama’s signature health-care law is not inevitable. He says Democrats can win over GOP lawmakers who’ve been facing angry constituents at town hall meetings.

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Read more: http://www.salon.com/2017/02/25/democrats-gop-medicaid-reform-plan-is-really-about-tax-cuts/

[putitinD]

1. evertything the GOP does is really about tax cuts for the wealthy.

[Sebasdad22]

2. Bingo.

[Freddie]

3. 100% correct

Their only motivation. That and regulating women's bodies - the one issue (IMO) that put Dolt 45 ahead in the places that count.

[hibbing]

12. Yeps n/t

[elmac]

4. Everything these fascists do

Is for the uber rich, even under the pretense of religion.

[putitinD]

6. +1

[Matthew28]

5. All the gop gives a damn about is the super rich

To hell with the rest of the country! As far as they're concern it can become a third world cess pool.

[SunSeeker]

7. So is Trump's "Infrastructure Plan." It is all a con, meant to transfer wealth to the rich. nt

[AndyTiedye]

13. They Will Kill Obama's Infrastructure Plans and Replace them with Nothing

Just like health care.

They have killed high speed rail and Caltrain electrification in California, wasting all the money that has already been spent an obligating the state to pay millions in penalties because contracts have already been signed.

[Bengus81]

8. The State cost of repeal?? Huh??

Idiot boy Brokeback here in Kansas never did an exchange,didn't want the money hoping it would fail in a short time. So what kind of expense could Kansas have had in 2012/2013?

[progree]

10. All's I can think of is that some Republican governors accepted the Medicaid expansion

90% of that cost is paid for by the federal government. So ACA repeal will affect those states.

Even in Kansas which had no state exchange and didn't accept the Medicaid expansion, some Kansans did get ACA health insurance through healthcare.gov. If some of those don't get health insurance after the repeal of the ACA (as is likely looking at the RepubliCON alternatives), some of them will end up getting sick and ending up in Kansas hospitals' emergency rooms, and some of them won't be able to pay the bill. That's all I can think of.

[progree]

9. Includes a big tax cut for the top two income tax brackets

The ACA imposed a 3.8% Net Investment Income Tax (NIIT) on unearned income in the top 2 tax brackets, and a 0.9% Medicare surcharge on earned income, also on the top 2 brackets (that's for taxable incomes over $416,700). Anyway those surtaxes go away under the RepubliCON plan:

The legislation would take down the foundation of Obamacare, including the unpopular individual mandate, subsidies based on people’s income, and all of the law’s taxes
-- http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/house-republicans-obamacare-repeal-package-235343

And has been noticed elsewhere, the subsidies to help pay the premiums would be based on age AND NOT ON INCOME. So a poor person or middle income person would get no more help than a rich person. And along with the Medicaid rollback, this is all a huge transfer of wealth from the bottom and middle to the top. (Surprise!)

And the subsidy would not be that much:

For a person under age 30, the credit would be $2,000 (($167/mo)). That amount would double for beneficiaries over the age of 60 (($333/mo)), according to the proposal.

(My last premium at age 64 was $858/mo. So I'd have to come up with more than $500/mo, regardless of how poor or rich I was)

Some more discussion of the lovely features of the RepubliCON plan:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141711958

[Matthew28]

11. The same rich

That offshores their taxes
Outsource our jobs
Use slave labor in the third world
Pay little effective taxes in the case of the big businesses.

These are the people that should be punished for their behavior.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

14. All the things they are trying to do is going to backfire on them hardcore starting in 2018

The people are going to get more and more angry and not only will Democrats win the majority of the house and senate but the people will want and support a drastic move to the left. Democrats will only need to remind people of what Trump did and that Republicans supported him and/or did nothing to stop him. This will haunt the GOP for the next 40 years or more.

[riversedge]

15. I will your optimism