Taxation & Estate Planning

The IRS Connection in New Health Reform Bill

By Darrin Mish

In a 1,018 page thick humongous document, the government intends to pass through Congress its new Healthcare Reform Bill.

Many objections have been made by concerned individuals and groups over the provisions of the bill because in the final analysis, the bill severely restricts Americans' choice of their own health insurance and thereby 'forces' the American public to opt for the government-sponsored healthcare insurance scheme.

Here's how it works.

The bill categorically states the provisions of acceptable healthcare insurance coverage, for example, it must cover hospitalization, outpatient treatment costs, fees of doctors and other healthcare professionals and the cost of services, equipment, supplies and drugs that they prescribe etc. By doing so, the government outlaws every insurance scheme that does not fully provide all of these provisions. One example would be the popular Health Savings Account (HSA) that many Americans enjoy today because of its affordability. Therefore, by excluding affordable healthcare insurance plans like the HSA, Americans are compelled to find other insurance plans for their healthcare. If you cannot find another one that is affordable and also fulfills the criteria of the new Healthcare Reform Bill, then you would have no choice but to take the government-sponsored one.

Another aspect of the bill has to do with employers who provide their staff with in-house healthcare insurance schemes. From big multinational corporations like Time Warner to the regular Mom and Pop enterprise down the street, every employer must ensure their own healthcare coverage complies with that stated by the Healthcare Reform Bill. If it does not, the government imposes a tax of 8% of the salaries of the employees. The fact is, 8% is probably not as much as the employers are paying now to maintain their own in-house insurance. Therefore, guess what most employers would do? That's right, most of them would cancel their own policies and pay the 8% tax in order to save cost, leaving you to either find another private insurance scheme on your own or go under the government's healthcare insurance scheme. And since the costs of private insurance schemes are likely to rise with the introduction of this bill, guess which choice most Americans are likely to take?

Suppose your employer chooses to continue providing you with an in-house healthcare insurance policy, they would be left with little option but to choose your policy through an 'exchange' set up by the government to limit what policies are offered. Either way, it's either the government's way or the highway.

The bill also grants authority to the 'Commissioner' together with the Secretary of Health and Human Services to evaluate the documents of any company to see if they can provide adequate healthcare coverage to their employees in accordance with the provisions of the bill. Furthermore, it also authorizes the Commissioner to determine whether any company can continue providing in-house healthcare coverage for their employees.

Finally, in pages 167 and 168, section 401, the bill states that if you are without the proper insurance, the IRS will tax you a tax of 2.5% of your modified adjusted gross income minus the amount of gross income specified in section 6012(a)(1). In other words, if you do not have a healthcare plan that complies with what the government wants, the IRS will be on your tail.

Once again, the effect is you choose either the government's way or the highway.

Full post as published by IRS Problem Solver Blog on September 13, 2009 (boomark / email).