Candidate Edwards: raise taxes for healthcare

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070204/pl_nm/usa_politics_edwards_dc;_ylt=Avbfp0rdUTMvFLG6pszBu5vMWM0F;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b2NibDltBHNlYwM3MTY-

Candidate Edwards: raise taxes for healthcare

20 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic U.S. presidential candidate
John Edwards on Sunday said that he would raise taxes, chiefly on the wealthy, to pay for expanded healthcare coverage under a plan costing $90 billion to $120 billion a year to be unveiled on Monday.


"We'll have to raise taxes. The only way you can pay for a healthcare plan that cost anywhere from $90 to $120 billion is there has to be a revenue source," Edwards said on NBC's Meet the Press news program.

The 2004 vice presidential nominee and former North Carolina senator said his plan would "get rid of
George Bush's tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year."

He said the plan would also reduce healthcare costs.

"Finally we need to do a much better job of collecting the taxes that are already owed," he said, specifically targeting what he said are large amounts of unpaid capital gains taxes.

He's speaking the truth, but the right-wingers are licking their chops over this.

left over to invest on people rather than war.

America must return to the principles laid down by our Founding Fathers. A permanent large military is a threat to our freedoms!

:kick:

And quite well put.

isn't it costing us AT LEAST that much each year?

As * said himself; the wealthy often don't pay taxes at all. Neither do many corporations. That obviously needs to change for a good number of reasons.

:woohoo:

Um, no, we don't. Stop wasting so much money on the miliary/black budget, and we already pay enough in taxes to afford single-payer, universal healthcare.

Edwards would roll them back.

If you read the whole article, you'll discover that this is a hodge podge of private insurance, and a "government plan" (Medicare) for "people who like the idea of a single-payer health insurance plan."

The result will be that everyone who desperately needs health insurance but can't get it or afford it will flock to the "government plan," while the insurance companies will be left with those who are healthy and don't really need insurance right now. In other words, this plan is even further away from what used to be the underlying principle of health insurance -- pooled risk -- than the fiasco we have now.

If Edwards were articulate enough, he could easily sell a plan to bring the whole country under medicare, fund it entirely from taxes, and do away with the predatory insurance companies with their obscene overhead and multi-million dollar salaries to their CEO's. In such a scenario, taxes would go up for sure. But after taking into account the fact that people (and businesses) would no longer be required to pay monthly premiums to the insurance companies, the net effect would be a wash and, for many people, would actually be less out-of-pocket.

it is not worth much. I don't want reform....I want total overhaul of a beyond repair system. Anything else is window dressing.

Besides the fact you are a Browns fan also shows that great minds think alike!:toast:

re-instate taxes on dividends, and efficiently collect the taxes that corporations/people are suppose to pay. I don't know about you all, but most Americans won't suffer a great deal because of a roll back of Bush's tax cuts for those making over 200,000 whereas health care would probably be appreciated by most workers.

take profit out of the illness industry.

i.e., one for the haves less and one for the haves more ... and, as long as we resolve problems by looking through the eyes of We citizens and not through the eyes of Big Insurance and its lobbyists ...

I endorse embracing the Conyers-Kucinich plan introduced in February 2005 ... time's a'wasting ...


"We can build one America where we no longer have two health care systems ... we have a plan that will offer all Americans the same health care that your senator has." - John Edwards, 2004


John Edwards addressing the Democratic National Convention in 2004:

~snip~

"I have spent my life fighting for the kind of people I grew up with.

For two decades, I stood with kids and families against big HMOs and big insurance companies.

When I got to the Senate, I fought those same fights against the Washington lobbyists and for causes like the Patients' Bill of Rights.

I stand here tonight ready to work with you and John to make America stronger. And we have much work to do, because the truth is ...

we still live in a country where there are two different Americas...

... one, for all of those people who have lived the American dream and don't have to worry, and another for most Americans, everybody else who struggle to make ends meet every single day.

It doesn't have to be that way.

We can build one America where we no longer have two health care systems: one for families who get the best health care money can by, and then one for everybody else rationed out by insurance companies, drug companies, HMOs.

Millions of Americans have no health coverage at all.

It doesn't have to be that way. We have a plan...

We have a plan that will offer all Americans the same health care that your senator has. We can give you tax breaks to help you pay for your health care. And when we're in office, we will sign a real patients' bill of rights into law so that you can make your own health care decisions. - John Edwards, speech to the DNC, July 28, 2004

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22230-2004Jul28.html


"The underlying problem is that we treat health care like a market commodity instead of a social service. Health care is targeted not to medical need, but to the ability to pay. Markets are good for many things, but they are not a good way to distribute health care." - Dr. Marcia Angell in introducing H. R. 676

http://kucinich.us/issues/universalhealth.php
http://www.house.gov/conyers/news_hr676_2.htm
http://www.pnhp.org/ (Physicians for a National Health Program)

And, short of that, SB840 in California.

I thought what would happen if we all and I mean ALL Americans canceled our health insurance. Currently, the hospitals might refuse people of color and poor people (or make their lives miserable trying to obtain service) but let middle America show up at their door by the 10's of thousands without insurance and watch what happens.

I guess my thought is if we all stuck together the pols of both parties could no longer ignore us or treat us as if we didn't matter. If they did we could just eliminate them. When are the people (middle and lower class) going to band together for their own protection from the rich ruling class?