Posted on 09/26/2009 5:58:52 AM PDT by reaganaut1
Who would have thought that so many people would go to the mat over the lowly flexible spending account?
Flexible spending accounts allow people to take money out of their paychecks before paying taxes on it and to set it aside to use for health care expenses that insurance doesn’t cover. There is no legal limit on how much you can set aside each year, though employers generally set a cap around $4,000 or $5,000.
Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana and author of the Senate health care bill, would like to place a much lower $2,500 annual limit on what people can save, among other restrictions. The House-Senate Joint Committee on Taxation figures this will allow the government to take in $14.6 billion from 2011 and 2019. So far so good right? We have to pay for the health care bill somehow.
The problem, however, is that to people who put more than $2,500 away each year, this looks an awful lot like a tax increase. After all, if they can’t put as much money aside, they’ll pay more in income and payroll taxes. And President Obama, when he was running for office, promised that no family earning under $250,000 would see higher taxes.
Now, a not-quite grass-roots effort has sprung up, led by companies that administer flexible spending accounts and others. At savemyflexplan.org, the group encourages individuals to write their representatives in Washington and sound off.
The question, however, is whether this is something worth fighting for.
Flexible spending accounts are great in theory. They can cover co-pays and deductibles, birth control and abortion, Lasik and glasses. Orthodontists love them, since braces are eligible, too.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
That is what a health savings account is, which exist and work extremely well in lowering healthcare spending (consumer can negotiate with doctors) and increase savings for families.
Flexible Spending Accounts was a liberal way of a half-measure health savings account.
The Democrats claim that people are not paying their way for health care and they are going to “fix it”. Yet every group the Democrats go after are already paying their own way. Tax people who save money for their own health care and who are not taking it from their neigbors. Tax people with insurance that is nicer than what the government wants to offer... Tax the “wealthy” who are already paying their own way along with paying for many others as well...
The Democrats are liars and thieves.
Democrats have to micromanage every aspect of our lives...
Democrats have no problem sacrificing liberty for “the greater good” all without any understanding of what the greater good really is.
Every request for a payment is returned after a couple of weeks with a rejection and a packet of legalese.
And try calling....good luck on that.
Obamacare will be Romneycare on steroids, and Romneycare, which might have been a good idea, as far as helping folks out who couldn't afford insurance, or covering folks who might not be able to get insurance because of pre-existing conditions, has morphed into a bureaucratic nightmare. The Democrats in the Legislature are deciding what coverage everyone should have, whether you want it, or not!
The first year, our premiums weren't too bad, considering this is MA. It was around 9K for the year, for hubby, me, and our two college aged kids. When it came time to renew, the state piled Prescription Drug Coverage onto the policy, with an additional $4K premium! We asked that it be taken off, since we didn't want it, and we were told that it was mandated by the legislature. Buncha Nanny-Staters believe they know better than we what we need. Disgusting!
Healthcsre savings accounts WORK and WORK WELL. They give employees (taxpayers) a way to save on taxes while saving for healthcare expenses - and the lower taxes benefit the employers who then pay less in their part of the tax burden!
OF COURSE Dems do NOT LIKE these healthcare savings accounts because they lower taxes and they give more freedom to the consumers of healthcare - taxpayers!
I love my healthcare savings account and use it every year (if you don’t use it you lose it)...I will go now and join those fighting to KEEP these freedom giving, consumer driven, tax saving accounts!!
The only problems we ran into were in the first couple of months we were on the plan. For the first 15 days of the year the account was empty and my wife had to pay for a doctor's visit and a couple of prescriptions out-of-pocket. (Once you have enough money in the account you can write a check to pay yourself back, but my wife was not amused.) Initially I calculated our health care spending a little too well, our account was always approaching zero. Occasionally there wasn't enough in the account and we had to reach into our normal funds. I increased my deposit amount and we haven't had a problem since.
These accounts should be called inflexible spending accounts because of the requirement to spend the money in a fiscal year. The tax code needs revision on health care. I would apply uniform deduction limits to health care spending for individuals covering both employer based plans and non employer plans. Health savings accounts would be used to bank the deductions for both. The tax code has a terrible provision by favoring employer deductions and not allowing individual deductions.
We’re planning to move out of MA, as soon as we can get our house remodeled and sold, and move back to MS. I think we could probably buy the type of plan we want most anywhere in the US, except for other nanny states, like NY, and NJ, but we didn’t plan to move to either of those places anyway. ;o)
The is already the case with Health Savings Accounts. The New York Times is deceitfully writing this story. HSA's are ALSO being made illegal in both HB3200 AND the Baucus bill. The HSA with a Hidh-Deductible (HDHP) is the BEST for many, many people (I am speaking from personal experience) . According to the HSA Newsletter, 8 million have it ...and will lose it.
(underlining mine.)
The definition of "acceptable plan" ALSO makes it illegal, even if one is saving much less than $2500/year in the HSA.
Unfortunately there does not seem to be a Democrat anywhere who has been willing or able to engage on this issue.
Then you don’t have a good FSA.
Mine has a debit card, and I’ve never had to provide documentation.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.