How They Pay for It
Posted on June 19, 2009
How They Pay For It: Breaking Promises Of the Obama Campaign
House Democrats are preparing to break President Obama’s campaign promises as a way to pay for his health care plan.
According to the Associated Press, Ways and Means Committee Democrats are contemplating the following tax increase:
- Increasing the price of soda and other sugary drinks by 10 cents a can.
- Applying a potential 2 percent income tax increase to single taxpayers earning more than $200,000 a year and households earning more than $250,000.
- A new employer payroll tax could target 3 percent of employers' health care expenditures.
- Taxing employer-provided health insurance benefits above certain levels - a less likely option but one that still is in the running.
The soda tax, like the tobacco tax, hits poor people the hardest. The poor drink more pop than other groups and they can least afford to pay the tax. The President said he wasn’t going to raise taxes on poor people. Whoops.
The President also said he was only going to raise taxes on people making more than $250,000 a year. Single people are people too. Whoops.
The President beat up poor John McCain when he offered a plan to start tax health insurance benefits in order to pay for wider reform. Guess what? That is exactly what the President is now doing, if the Democrats plan goes forward. Whoops.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see other sin taxes targeted. If they tax pop, why wouldn’t they tax beer, wine, vodka or tequila, for that matter? Why wouldn’t they tax transfat, or gas or cheeseburgers? Why wouldn’t they tax red meat, white meat, brown meat or any other kind of meat?
Get ready to spend a lot more for stuff that you like. If you like it, the Democrats will tax it. That seems to be their new strategy, at least, campaign promises be damned.