Healthcare reform is about helping middle class families. Before the Affordable Care Act was passed, children were denied coverage for urgent treatments, leaving parents to pay out of pocket. Seniors in the Medicare "Donut Hole" coverage gap saw their budgets explode with the rising cost of prescription drugs, and a new generation of young people set out into the job market without crucial healthcare coverage. I joined my colleagues in the House to fix this problem.
The time for political hand wringing is over. The Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act, and we now need to put partisanship aside and implement the benefits and patient protections that this law delivers for middle class families on Long Island.
Many of my colleagues in the House of Representatives are plotting repeal, and my opponent has indicated he supports repeal as well, without offering any plan to replace it.
It's clear that the law is already working for families and businesses in New York’s First District, by the numbers:
4,700: The number of young adults who are able to stay on their parents’ insurance, making sure that while they’re getting started in their careers, they don’t have to worry about losing everything from getting sick.
9,400: The number of seniors who received a prescription drug discount, with an average discount of $710 per senior.
81,000: The number of seniors who received preventative services without having to pay co-pays, coinsurance or deductibles.
710: The number of small businesses that received tax credits to maintain and expand their healthcare coverage offerings to employees.
9,000: The number of children with pre-existing conditions who can no longer be denied coverage.
$86.5 million: The rebate 1 million in New York State will receive from insurance companies that spent more than twenty percent of their costs on executive pay and marketing, instead of medical care. It works out to an average of $138 per family.
We shouldn’t go back. We shouldn’t let free riders make the rest of us foot the bill when they get sick. We shouldn’t tell the parents of 9,000 children in this district that if their child gets sick, expensive treatment is going to come out of their pocket. We shouldn't leave behind seniors who struggle on fixed incomes to keep up with soaring drug prices. We shouldn’t deny our young adults, who are just starting their careers, access to good, affordable healthcare. And we should never again let insurance companies drop coverage when a patient gets sick.
This law is about eliminating barriers between doctors and patients, and it’s about making healthcare coverage better for all families.
Everything that you have written is false, and that includes "and" and "the" (apologies to Mary McCarthy.) http://www.snopes.com/politics/taxes/realestate.asp
One last time, Jaguar-Guy is WRONG but perseverates in posting false information although having been repeatedly corrected. Read the link, the 3.8% tax applies only to high earners ($$200k/$$250K/yr. [single/couple]) and only if it exceeds the home sale exclusion ($$250K/$$500K.) 97% of all home sales will be untaxed.
The new law may not be perfect, but change was needed. And there are very many things going on on the other side of the equation that don't get a lot of press. For example, do you know how much money is allocated to charity care and uncompensated care? That is for when practitioners treat people who aren't poor enough to qualify for Medicaid but not rich enough to pay for the treatment they need. You know today these people receive treatment anyway, right? These pools are going to be greatly diminished as people move from 'no gots' to some form of insurance. It is very frustrating to listen to people who seem to think that they are not paying for the healthcare of those who currently cannot afford it. You are already paying for this! The theory behind the new laws is that the funding mechanism will be more stable (as in everyone has some type of insurance) as opposed to a complete free for all where those without insurance wind up waiting until they are much sicker (and it then costs more to treat them) to obtain care. It will take a while for everything to settle in, but the way it was was NOT sustainable.
Based on the data you provide, your friend earns over $$200K/yr. and has netted $$1.5M taxable income (after exemption) from the sale of his home . He is thus a member of the class (the 3% of all home sellers) who will pay the tax, as I described above. One can either analyze citations to authority or construe reality to fit one's preconceptions. You have chosen the latter course. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- to Jaguar-Guy: Of course I am opposed to the flat tax. The pain of taxation should be spread as equally as possible over the entire income spectrum. An amount that would be eviscerating to a low income earner is a gratuity to a billionaire.
"How many of you know someone who WORKS who has been financially crippled by a health crisis, or someone who has forgone important healthcare because they couldn't afford it" "The new law may not be perfect, but change was needed" "You are already paying for this! " "the funding mechanism will be more stable" "a complete free for all where those without insurance wind up waiting until they are much sicker to obtain care" "the way it was was NOT sustainable"
Newsflash! Your 2 decades late and a few hundred million short dumbass! But I'm sure you'll find a way to continue to screw over the working middle class of Long Island the way you have this past decade.
Let the ideologues rant and rave all they like about "socialism" knowing that this legislation helps even those who don't realize they need it.
The AARP found the legislation would not cut benefits or increase out-of-pocket costs for Medicare, the federal health-care program for Americans over 65. But Republicans argue that there's no way to cut future costs that much without reducing services. The CBO found it was "unclear" whether the Senate bill could reduce the growth of Medicare spending without reducing care. Incidentally, the GOP has found itself on the business end of this claim before: A 1995 plan to cut projected Medicare spending by more than $250 billion over seven years triggered a budget confrontation with the Clinton administration that partially shut down the federal government. The verdict: Misleading. Though the full impact of the Senate bill the CBO examined may not be known for years, the proposal is aimed at cutting the rate of growth of Medicare spending without cutting benefits.