Posted on 11/13/2005 6:54:21 AM PST by Graybeard58
"The worst crime against working people is a company which fails to operate at a profit." -- Samuel Gompers, the American Federation of Labor's first president.
A small business that provides the sort of comprehensive medical benefits that union-owned politicians might deem appropriate turns no profit and soon is no longer in business and is putting "working families" in the unemployment line. Politicians may think all workers are "entitled" to the same benefits enjoyed by unionized public employees, but no real-world company operating on that philosophy survives very long.
From their own budget-balancing quandaries, politicians know full well that insurance premiums were expensive even before the annual double-digit-percentage increase of recent years. Yet they constantly try to force businesses to insure their employees. Massachusetts is the latest to try.
House Democrats want to impose a payroll tax on employers whose workers are uninsured. Those with 10 to 100 employees would pay 5 percent while larger ones would pay 7 percent. The $700 million that this tax, alternately referred to as "an assessment" and "a contribution," would raise would go to expand Medicaid coverage to nearly a quarter-million Massachusetts residents, who instantly would have no cause to try to better themselves because they would be addicted to government-financed health care.
The other 250,000 Bay-Staters who have no insurance but don't qualify for Medicaid would be required by law to buy it, but if they could afford it, wouldn't they have it by now? They already work for companies that don't provide insurance, but with their employers paying the new jobs tax, their chances of getting coverage from their company jobs would drop to nil.
Not surprisingly, unions, consumer groups, social activists, doctors and the Massachusetts Hospitals Association are all for the tax. For most businesses, the choice is the devil or the deep blue sea.
Most will opt to pay the tax because it will be less costly than the insurance, but they will extract money from the paychecks of workers or the wallets of consumers. Companies with 11 or 12 employees soon would have nine, and those with eight or nine will never have 10. Businesses whose insurance expenses exceed 7.01 percent of payroll costs will be enticed to cancel their policies and pay the tax, thereby increasing the rolls of the uninsured and forcing more people to buy their own insurance.
More than a few businesses will see this as the final straw and close or move to a state where taxes and the costs of employment, energy and real estate aren't so high. Another tax on business is not what a high-cost state with anemic job growth needs, and in that regard, Samuel Gompers would be the first to oppose it on principle.
Exactly. Guess you 'have to be a rocket scientist' to figure that out if you are in the elected Congress.
I am pretty sure this plan will work. The state will raise taxes, these employees will lose their jobs, fall below the poverty line, and then they will qualify for Medicaid. Problem solved. :(
That would be my guess also.
This has nothing to do with unions. Nothing at all.
On a per capita income basis, Massachusetts taxes are LOWER than in such right-to-work states as Georgia and North Carolina.
Right-to-work states are generally states with lower educational levels than northern states, so they need every advantage they can get to close the gap. It helps a little bit, until companies realize they can get low-skilled workers even cheaper than what Mississippi offers if they go to a foreign country.
Employers don't "owe" health insurance to their workers. All employers need be responsible for is the paying of wages. If employees want to spend a part of those wages on health care -- fine. If not -- well, that's fine also.
True or not it really doesn't matter in this case, does it?
Mass is about to impose a 7% tax on businesses. Do you think that will attract businesses to the state or drive them away?
Oh, it's not going to help.
The question is whether it then lowers the costs that get billed to the state for health care for those workers when they show up at the hospital anyway. Either we pay through our income taxes, or the companies that choose not to insure their workers carry the cost.
Since companies in Mass do not belong to the state but to their shareholders this 7% tax will adversely affect their bottomline.
So the only question is whether or not the people of Mass will shoulder the burden of this 7% tax in higher fees for goods and services or whether this will increase unemployment by businesss laying off the number of people required to cover the cost of the new tax.
Either way the taxpayers of the state will be paying for the healthcare of these workers.
You are absolutely correct. Time for "Atlas Shrugged," IMO.
Carolyn
Like the great levels in Mass where they have 100% of those problems and the 2 most disgusting senators in the nation??
The larger companies, particularly the public companies, already provide health care to their employees. They won't be paying this tax.
It's the smaller companies that will pay the tax. They're more likely to provide health care to their employees instead of paying the tax, which is the point of the new tax, after all--to goad them to do that. A lot of these smaller companies aren't going anywhere because they do things like construction and services that need to be done here. They'll end up passing some of the costs on to the consumer.
(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")
I hate to tell you this but probably most areas of the US suck for jobs if you don't already have money or don't know a profession.
As for FL having a higher tax rate than NH: We have no income tax, I pay a 7% sales tax in my county and I pay $1100 a year property tax on a house worth $250k.
Like NH, we also have some toll roads.
I know my aunt and uncle have to pay an arm and a leg for property taxes to live in NH.
The smaller companies you speak of that will pass "some" of the tax on to consumers will pass all of it or hire more illegals. Illegals that you will still pay for health costs.
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