The whole point of McCain's system is to drive people into the individual market, where fewer people will sign up because the challenge of signing up will be too overwhelming, where regulation is harder to enforce because there are far more policy/body interactions, and so forth. Don't get sick, and for God's sake don't have a preexisting condition.
To be fair to McCain's plan, this is offset by a universal refundable health care tax credit and incentive for individual plans to get the same rate as group plans used to, in order to lower overall costs.
I actually have mixed feelings about this idea. I am not completely against excluding it from the pre-tax portion of your paycheck since folks forced into the individual market have to pay with post-tax dollars. Why should I get a tax benefit because I'm employed by someone willing/forced to pay for my health coverage? I wouldn't LIKE to pay taxes, but it doesn't seem fair the way it stands now.
This isn't to say I think the individual market is a good place to be. Just that I don't feel like folks who opt to go that way should be penalized in the tax code. Wasn't there an idea being floated by Bush that they'd do this also, but then provide an exemption on the federal return that everyone paying for health care could use? That seems like a much more fair solution to everyone.
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This isn't to say I think the individual market is a good place to be. Just that I don't feel like folks who opt to go that way should be penalized in the tax code. Wasn't there an idea being floated by Bush that they'd do this also, but then provide an exemption on the federal return that everyone paying for health care could use? That seems like a much more fair solution to everyone.
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