Thread: 18 Democratic senators revolt against Harry Reid on Obamacare tax

18 Democratic senators revolt against Harry Reid on Obamacare tax

10:33 AM 12/12/2012
Patrick Howley

Eighteen Democratic U.S. Senators and senators-elect sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid last week calling for a “delay in the implementation” of the medical device tax in Obamacare, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The provision was an integral part of the version of the Obamacare law, which was passed in the Senate under Reid’s stewardship in 2009. It is set to take effect on January 1, 2013.

An effort to repeal the provision failed in Congress in June. At the time, Reid characterized the proposed repeal as a Republican attack on Obamacare.

“The medical technology industry directly employs over 400,000 people in the United States and is responsible for a total of two million high-skilled manufacturing jobs. … With this year quickly drawing to a close, the medical device industry has received little guidance about how to comply with the tax — causing significant uncertainty and confusion for businesses,” according to the letter.

“We urge you to support delaying enactment of this provision in a fiscally responsible manner.”

The provision’s 2.3 percent excise tax on medical device manufacturers has sparked panic within the medical devices industry. Indiana-based Zimmer Holdings, which manufactures hip replacement implants, laid off 450 workers in anticipation of $60 million in taxes in 2013. Michigan-based Stryker Corp., which also produces hip implants, laid off 5 percent of its workers in a bid to compensate for the $100 million it will pay in taxes next year.

The provision has proved to be problematic for Democratic senators from states with large numbers of medical device companies. Indiana Senator-elect Joe Donnelly and Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow signed the letter alongside the next Massachusetts Senate delegation, Elizabeth Warren and John Kerry, whose state is home to more than 400 medical device companies.

Democrats sent their letter to Reid less than three weeks after dozens of medical device industry executives “swarmed” Capitol Hill in a lobbying push that resulted in more than 60 different meetings with legislators. The trade groups Advanced Medical Technology Association, Medical Imaging and Technology Alliance, and Medical Device Manufacturers Association led the lobbying effort to delay the provision.

The medical device industry has a powerful lobby in Washington. In the third quarter of 2011, when medical device manufacturers began their big-money push to stop the medical device tax, the industry spent more than $32 million lobbying Congress. Prominent political donor General Electric spent $5.7 million that quarter to lead all medical device lobbyists.

Read more: 18 Democratic senators buck Harry Reid on Obamacare tax | The Daily Caller

Check the names on the letter. It seems that they should have read the bill instead of having written by the Apollo Group. JMO


http://online.wsj.com/public/resourc...er12102012.pdf

Democrats houlsn't be able to oick and chose for their own political ambitions. They stuck us with this, they should have to eat it the same way it was shoved down the throats of the American people. JMO

SENATE DEMOCRATS URGE UNDOING OF OBAMACARE



by DR. SUSAN BERRY 12 Dec 2012

Many powerful Democrats, even some of the most liberal among them, are supporting what amounts to adismantling of President Obama’s signature health care law.

Using “Republican” language to make their case, these Democrats are attempting to repeal some of the funding mechanisms as well as the cost-containment measures that were purportedly inherent in the law.

With some of their most influential constituent groups facing onerous tax increases that are slated to help fund the law’s mandates and regulations, Senators like Al Franken (D-MN), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Charles Schumer (D-NY), Patty Murray (D-WA), John Kerry (D-MA), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), and others -- all of whom voted in favor of the law -- are aiming to delay or outright repeal parts of ObamaCare.
A top Senate staffer explained (after ObamaCare passed), “This is a coverage bill, not a cost reduction bill.” David Bowen, who helped to craft the legislation, said that Senate Democrats had planned to follow in the path of Massachusetts’ RomneyCare plan by providing insurance coverage first, “knowing that that would bring on a cost battle second.”

In fact, RomneyCare’s mandates and subsidies caused health care costs to dramatically increase in the Bay state, leading the current governor and state legislature to exert never-before-seen controls on insurers and health care providers as they also raised taxes.

Not surprisingly, as Senate Democrats have gotten a look at what exactly is in ObamaCare, the parts of the law that were intended to control costs have gradually been stripped from the legislation.

Democrats first repealed the CLASS Act, the long-term care insurance provision of the law, which they realized would work against its intended goal of reducing the deficit. Similarly, they repealed another supposed “deficit reducer,” the “1099 provision,” that would have forced burdensome paperwork upon small businesses for the sake of discovering more “taxable” transactions.

Now, Minnesota’s two Democrat Senators, Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar, are using “Republican” terminology to delay the 2.3% medical device tax scheduled to take effect on January 1^st. For these Senators, the tax, which is supposed to raise $28 billion over the next decade to fund the law, is now a “job-killing tax” that will not only cost jobs but make it more difficult for American medical device manufacturers to be competitive and innovative.

It turns out Senators Franken and Klobuchar have been enlightened of these facts by medical device companies in their home state of Minnesota; they've joined 16 other Democrat Senators who now share the same view. In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, these Senators have asked for a delay in the medical device tax, but they are actually aiming for a full repeal of this part of the law.

The delay/repeal bug appears to have bitten members of the health care industry as well, including some doctors, hospitals, and drug companies who originally supported ObamaCare because of the fact that it is chock full of subsidies for many of these health care sectors.

However, the Independent Payment Advisory Panel (IPAB), the board of unelected officials that will determine which medical treatments and procedures are too costly for some patients, is supposed to impose cost controls on federal medical spending.

Threatened by these cost-containment provisions, these members of the health care industry are now intent on eliminating this panel, again using “Republican” terminology, like, “The AMA will work to stop the IPAB from causing this type of double-jeopardy situation for physicians and compromising access to care for seniors and baby-boomers.”

It appears many of the groups that originally supported ObamaCare want to be able to have their cake and eat it, too, and Senate Democrats seem poised to allow them to do just that. The question is, without these sources of funding for all the ObamaCare mandates, and without cost-containment, as intrinsically horrific as mechanisms like the IPAB may be, how will the law be implemented at all?

Senate Democrats Urge Undoing of ObamaCare