How does a $5000 tax credit help when the average family health care plan now costs more than $12,500/year, and how are working families expected to pay the difference?
- Why let insurers sell across state lines if it wipes out state consumer protections in the process?
- Where will people with pre-existing conditions get quality, affordable coverage if they’re pushed out of employer-based health insurance into the individual market?
What We Already Know:
1. McCain will tax your health care benefits at work
John McCain's health care plan will make people pay income taxes on the value of their health care benefits at work. So if your employer pays $10,000 a year for your health insurance, you will start having to pay taxes on that $10,000 just like you do on your wages or salary.
2. And give you a tax credit for less than five months of health care (after that you're on your own).
McCain will give a family a tax credit of $5,000 – paid to your insurance company - but the average cost of a family health care plan in 2007 was $12,680. So McCain's plan will give you enough to pay from January to May. You'll need to come up with the money for June through December.
3. You may be one of 20 million people who will lose your health benefits
A study published in the respected journal Health Affairs found that 20 million will lose their employer-paid for health insurance under the McCain plan because many employers will decide they no longer have a responsibility to pay for health coverage for their workers.
4. And be forced to buy health insurance on your own
When you lose your health coverage at work, you'll need to look for coverage in the individual market. But you'll no longer have your employer doing the shopping for coverage and paying for coverage.
5. You won't be covered for pre-existing conditions and may not be able to get coverage at all
When you are on your own, health insurance companies do not cover pre-existing conditions, and they often refuse to sell any coverage to people who have had asthma, cancer, or other common diseases. The federal law that protects people who get health insurance at work doesn't apply when you buy health insurance in the individual market.
6. But you will pay higher premiums as you get older or sicker or if you're a woman
In the individual market, health insurance companies charge higher premiums to people as they get older, and they charge more for people who have been treated for illnesses. Younger women get charged more than men of the same age simply because they can become pregnant.