Large employers cite Obamacare ‘Cadillac’ tax in reducing benefits

NBC ^ | 11/25/2013 | Talesha Reynolds and Lisa Myers

[nascarnation]

I think it was just a way to let labor slide on the WW2 wage controls and it got enacted into law.

It’s no more logical than making car insurance tax exempt.
Just depends on who has the most powerful lobby in the tax writing rooms of Congress.

[nascarnation]

I’m not in favor of taxes.
I just feel our tax system is a mess of lobbyist driven preferences.

[Paladin2]

"there is no reason that home mortgages should be tax preferred."

Interest is an expense. There is no reason to tax income going to interest (cash flow as opposed to "profit") as interest paid should be taxed as real income to the Banksters (but taxed just once).

[digger48]

I believe you can write off your Health Insurance Premiums if they exceed 7.5% of Taxable Income.

Thanks to Obamacare, that percentage of AGI is now 10%

Along with that $1200/yr in my HSA that used to be tax free

along with the hike in my premium.

[eyedigress]

You have explained quite a bit to the washed and unwashed.

Insurance was a benefit to counteract Roosevelt.

[Paladin2]

"I just feel our tax system is a mess of lobbyist driven preferences. "

You have to answer the question:

What should be taxed to fund the gov't?

(Wealth?, Assets (neglecting liabilities)?, Cash Flow Income?, Profit?, Labor hour input?, Investments?, # of kids?, Nation wide trade outflows and inflows?, etc.)

[digger48]

I don’t particularly want anybody else to pay taxes on their insurance, just give those of us who buy our own to write off 100% of our premium to put us on the same playing field as a UAW worker

[nascarnation]

So are you in favor of bringing back the credit card interest deduction?

[Paladin2]

" car insurance tax exempt."

Car Insurance is a cost to your production and should be exempt from taxation.

[Paladin2]

"So are you in favor of bringing back the credit card interest deduction?"

Clearly.

It's a cost of being stupid. Why tax the stupid for spending stupidly? Debt is slavery.

[greeneyes]

Amen. Been one of my pet peeves for years.

[Susquehanna Patriot]

“... depends on who has the most powerful lobby in the tax writing rooms of Congress.”

No doubt.

If the employer-paid health insurance would lose its tax exempt status, and government truly wanted to promote a public policy of health insurance, then one consider making all insurance premiums paid as tax credit to the individual filer without having to itemize deductions. (Those who don’t buy insurance, no problem, they get the bill for services - no one picks up their tab.)

Sure Congress and the lobbyists would not go for this as it will cause people to lose power and their lobbyist jobs.

[RginTN]

Healthcare is such a right in Democrats opinion that they tax very generous private insurance that people voluntarily pay for!!

All part of the Healthcare Socialist redristubtion

[JSteff]

I'm gonna find a vet to put on retainer.

You may have meant to be funny, but I am rithinking it. Back in 2010 I was between jobs and M.S. flared up. Rather than spending a ton to go to the hospital the neurologist he put me on steroids. They said if that did not work then I would have to come in to handle it in the hospital.
The pills seemed to be working but I ran out in a week or so. So an RN I know check around and we found a few folks who had so steroids... but 2 of those were for their pets.
So over the next few days I finished all of those doses. As the R friend of mine said, they should be the same in the same dosage. They were, and they worked.
So a vet may be the least expensive way to get your pills anyway. I am sure there is something in obamacare that would fine me now if I handled it that way again.

[Susquehanna Patriot]

“there is no reason that home mortgages should be tax preferred.”

If I am not mistaken, the real estate interest deduction has been around since the passage of the 16th Amendment, when I am sure the average citizen did not own property. Only now that the average Joe owns some, are do we talk about taking it away. I miss Reagan.

[eyedigress]

Insurance is now mandatory. Think about it.

[2CAVTrooper]

If they get retired, they need to be stripped of their golden parachutes, and shoved out the back of the plane while flying over the ocean

[Paladin2]

I'm trying to be funny and series (;-))simultaneously.

Most "medicine" these daze is pill prescriptions.

Vets have access to writing script for drugs. They are also generally pretty smart and would know much about common mammalian diseases in humans. Given that they have script access to drugs, they could easily be much less expensive than the bureaucracies wrapped around human docs these daze.

Especially if your dog had a specific "issue". Just sayin'.

[Paladin2]

"people are going to avoid going to the hospital at all costs."

Lotsa peeps die in the Hospital, plus Hospitals are a nexus of some nasty bugs.

I'm not sayin' Hospitals are all bad, but Caveat Emptor.

[Susquehanna Patriot]

“Healthcare is such a right in Democrats opinion...”

Except the Socialists are clever enough not to believe their own lies. They say these things to divide people and to gain power. First they convince you it is a right,... the ignorant were not educated in the socialist schools to know it is not a “right”, ...then once you have given them the power to impose the “right” (even the packed Supreme Court rubber stamps the deal), Socialists now in control take away one’s freedom, consolidate their power and make the average ignoramus pay for the “right”.