NY Post: Raising Taxes On Health Care Doesn't Equal Cost-Cutting

Kirsten Powers has an editorial at the New York Post attacking the excise tax. "(N)no topic has gotten more ink during the health-care debate than cost," she observes. "This question has become the obsession distracting us from the moral imperative to provide health care to all Americans."

Powers draws a parallel between discussions of war policy and the health care debate, contrasting the resistance to questions of cost in matters of war with the way the matter is handled in health care. She writes this about the excise tax:

"The plan to tax so-called 'Cadillac health plans' has remained intact -- but, sorry, raising taxes doesn't equal cost-cutting."

Tax supporters would argue that the tax doesn't simply raise taxes. It would result in benefits cuts - less coverage, more out-of-pocket costs - in a way that would surgically trim unnecessary treatments while retaining necessary ones. Unfortunately, there are now some excellent studies which disprove that theory.

Kirsten Powers is right that "raising taxes doesn't equal cost-cutting." Slashing benefits indiscriminately, the excise tax's other likely effect, doesn't equal cost-cutting either. It just shifts a greater portion of that cost from the insurer to the individual. And by "individual," I mean everybody affected by this plan. Studies show that many plans will be affected by the tax even if they don't have particularly generous benefits, so "individual" could also mean pretty much anybody.

Views expressed on this page are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Campaign for America's Future or Institute for America's Future