NY Times - "In Health Bill, Obama Attacks Wealth Inequality"

[TomCADem]

I wonder whether Joe the Plumber will get another round of speaking engagements to talk about income distribution and socialism. The economic theories of Joe the Plumber at the Improv tonight!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/business/24leonhardt.html?hp

For all the political and economic uncertainties about health reform, at least one thing seems clear: The bill that President Obama signed on Tuesday is the federal government’s biggest attack on economic inequality since inequality began rising more than three decades ago.

Over most of that period, government policy and market forces have been moving in the same direction, both increasing inequality. The pretax incomes of the wealthy have soared since the late 1970s, while their tax rates have fallen more than rates for the middle class and poor.

Nearly every major aspect of the health bill pushes in the other direction. This fact helps explain why Mr. Obama was willing to spend so much political capital on the issue, even though it did not appear to be his top priority as a presidential candidate. Beyond the health reform’s effect on the medical system, it is the centerpiece of his deliberate effort to end what historians have called the age of Reagan.

***

The bill is the most sweeping piece of federal legislation since Medicare was passed in 1965. It aims to smooth out one of the roughest edges in American society — the inability of many people to afford medical care after they lose a job or get sick. And it would do so in large measure by taxing the rich.

***
The health reform bill will reverse that trend. By 2019, 95 percent of people are projected to be covered, up from 85 percent today (and about 90 percent in the late 1970s). Even affluent families ineligible for subsidies will benefit if they lose their insurance, by being able to buy a plan that can no longer charge more for pre-existing conditions. In effect, healthy families will be picking up most of the bill — and their insurance will be somewhat more expensive than it otherwise would have been.

[NYC_SKP]

1. Highly recommended.

Thanks for posting.

:thumbsup:

[eridani]

2. Jesus. Giving a trillion dollars of tax money to mass murderers

--will make all of us less poor. Right.

[jillan]

3. A BIG kick!

[KILL THE WISE ONE]

4. taxing the rich or treating all income equally

i work at a job so I pay a payroll, medicare tax on that income. if "the rich" make their money from a source other then a job that has a paycheck, Why is it not fair to tax that income at the same rate?

[JTFrog]

5. K&R!