Can the President still say that the mandate is not a "tax"??

[Motown_Johnny]

16. The tax/penalty will only be on 1 or 2 percent of the population.

That is what the argument is about.


Most of the law is about things like forcing the insurance companies to pay out at least 80% of revenue on health care procedures. This helps pay for some of the increased care.


Yes the expansion of Medicaid will cost some tax dollars but that is more of a redirection of funds other than a new expenditure. People who are already paying for health insurance have increased premiums because of the uninsured using the Emergency Room and never paying the bill. Admittedly this now comes out of tax dollars instead of going through private insurance so it could be represented as a tax increase. Over all this should decrease those costs because the private companies are still skimming a percentage of that as a profit while the Government will have lower overhead (as Medicare and Medicaid already have).



I would rather see that tax/penalty go towards a public option so that these people would still have some form of insurance. The conservatives don't like that because so many people would opt for the government care that it would hurt their insurance company donors.


Yes, this is a tax in the same way that a tomato is a fruit. It is, but it still kinda isn't.