Baucus Bill, The Real Cost of Obamacare Lite

If Mr. Obama were to enact the Baucus Senate Finance Committee version of health care siezure, it will add approximately $900 billion to the federal budget. Unfortunately, all that money will have to come be found. Much will come from eliminating funding Medicare Advantage, while the remainder will come from levying new taxes on "Cadillac" insurance, steep increases in income taxes, and new taxes on drugs as well as newly developed medical devices.

Additional sections of the bill are designed to raise new revenue streams designed to generate revenue,

including $426 billion in Medicare and Medicare Advantage benefit cuts, $4 billion in new fines imposed on those who do not purchase insurance, $201 billion in new levies on health insurance companies with high-end health insurance plans, $180 billion in new taxes on medical devices and drugs, $83 billion in new income taxes on individuals, and $25 billion in new taxes on employers. There will also be significant reductions in Medicare reimbursements to hospitals, which will in turn generate more cost shifting from such facilities to the patients using them.

Of course these taxes won't really affect those who are wealthy, but the rest of us will be hurt in a myriad of ways...because those "new revenue streams" will have to come from somewhere. The insurance industry will certainly absorb some of the impact, but the vast majority will be levied directly upon those people who actually pay taxes. Like you and me. I'm barely making it now, the approximately $2,500.00 per year in additional taxes that I will have to pay, along with the new taxes and rate hikes if Congress passes the "Cap & Trade" bill will break me. How about you?