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Comment by bobby_9x | Hacker News Reader

This is pretty useless.

We still don't really know what his tax plan is.

I heard him in an interview that the upper federal tax bracket will be 55%. This combined with state and local taxes means it will be closer to 75% (not including sales tax and countless other taxes that are paid).

It's just like in Norway and Sweden (the countries he wants to emulate). On paper, it looks like a small amount. But when it actually comes down to it, it makes it nearly impossible for even things like startups to thrive.

I also heard him say that the money will only come from 'greedy wallstreet executives' (I got a flyer in the mail saying exactly this).

I think many people will be in for a rude awakening when the middle class has to foot the bill for all of this and the system is substandard compared to the rest of the world.

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Why? Are startups paying huge salaries? Looking through his tax plan, if you make under $250k/year, your dividends/capital gains will be taxed at a low rate. The rate only increases if your income is above $250k, which doesn't seem unreasonable.

Most of his corporate tax plans also seem to centre around preventing tax evasion and closing loopholes for massive businesses. If he's really modelling his system after European states, that likely means subsidies for small businesses.

> The rate only increases if your income is above $250k, which doesn't seem unreasonable.

How "reasonable" that seems would depend on from which side of the $250k mark you are looking at it. Of course it is an easy sell to convince people to vote for a tax they don't have to pay. But such is democracy... two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.

The 'basic' cost of living for everyone is more or less the same. It's a proportionally larger share of your income if you have less money. $250K is a high wage relative to the cost of living in the US today.

Well... "more or less" has a pretty large variance. My mother rents a 2 bedroom duplex in Idaho for like $500/month. In the Bay Area I could probably rent a tent in my backyard for $500/month. A person making $150k/yr where she lives in Idaho is going to be far better off than a person making $250k/yr in the Bay Area.

Yes. But someone making $150k in either place is going to be better off than someone making $30k in either...

$251,429

I was curious.

http://www.bernietax.com/#251429;4955

Lots of people seemed opposed to ACA and a single-payer in the US but I never hear anyone talk about free market alternatives. What we have right now in the US is nothing like a market. Markets are supposed to provide price discovery. How can they do that when no one knows the price until after the work is done? It's insane and no one should be surprised that people want change.

What's the alternative to socialized healthcare? Everything staying the same? That's not going to fly.

Investments into price discovery mechanisms. You know, like what the ACA does.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/08/hospital-prices-cos...

https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Sta...

The US has begun to track health care costs, and is beginning to make it public. Oklahoma Hospitals are publishing prices, leading to a free-market solution.

http://newsok.com/article/5434353

You no longer have to leave the US to take advantage of Medical Tourism! Furthermore, health care plans are now required to have some degree of out-of-network costs under the ACA, so you know that even in the worst case, medical tourism to Oklahoma will lead to clear and consistent pricing. Or if you have good out-of-network costs (ie: More typical of the higher-cost Gold or Platinum plans), medical tourism might be a very good idea for you.

Hopefully, other hospitals will notice the beneficial (and profitable) effects of medical tourism, and will join the hospital free market association. At which point, they'll start publishing health-care prices online to capture marketshare in the growing medical tourism industry.

It will take years before the market builds out the infrastructure, but America is actually well on its way to fixing the problem. I think we should hold the course with Obamacare. Lets not go left (Bernie) or right (Repeal), lets keep steady and see what happens.

That's interesting. Thanks a lot. I really don't know enough to have an opinion on this stuff. I was just trying to express my bewilderment at the opposition to the ACA which didn't seem to offer any alternatives other than going back to what we had.

ACA is a surprisingly right-wing idea. Obama is a moderate for pushing it so hard. ACA will only work if the free-market steps up its game to rectify the price-discovery problem.

Its mind-boggling to me that the right-wing doesn't like Obamacare in general. The major 'left wing' portions are:

1. Individual Mandate (but all Republicans agree that pre-existing conditions are bad, but they have no idea how to get rid of it)

2. The health care exchange website (Republicans don't seem to like new government programs at all)

And... that's about it. Everything else attempts to leverage the free market infrastructure to solve the problem.

I believe a lot (perhaps most) of the opposition to the ACA was from people that do not benefit (or were actually adversely impacted) from it. For those people, there is no need to offer any alternative because going back to what we had is better for them.

>How can they do that when no one knows the price until after the work is done?

The sad part is that it is even more insane than that. For most things we buy, we have the ability to either walk away and say no or we have the ability to wait. For health care, there are many times when the service is an immediate need, so there is rarely an ability to even refuse it (I mean, you could opt for letting a potential problem kill you, but at that point we have basically gutted the meaning of 'need').

Not only that, but this whole health plan debate is weird for those of us in high deductible HSA plans. My health insurance costs negative $1000 ($-1000), because my company pays me extra if I choose an HSA plan, and the company covers the high deductible premium. What the heck happens to those if health insurance goes single payer?

You have to admit, it's a fucked up system when your employer is basically paying you not to use your insurance.

Your employer should have no influence on health care decisions, which is one of the many reasons we need to fix our current system.

> You have to admit, it's a fucked up system when your employer is basically paying you not to use your insurance.

That's not what an HSA plan is.

I'm not OP, but OP's situation is pretty common, and it's more equivalent to employers offering 401(k) matching. They deposit a certain amount of money each month into your HSA account, though by law, you can only have an HSA account if you're on a high-deductible plan.

Generally, the only employers who offer this are the ones who have the money to offer very attractive benefits (ie, tech companies). This usually includes covering part or all of employees' premiums, so their employees usually don't pick the government-mandated HMO plan option (it ends up not being any cheaper for them to choose the more restrictive plan).

HSAs in general are not a terrible idea; but they have created some scenarios (like OP's) that are pretty counter-intuitive. But HSAs are basically "small insurance" - if you max out your HSA on a high-deductible plan, you probably will never use your insurance. So you're paying for most normal medical expenses out of pocket, and your insurance plan is basically a backstop for if you get cancer, have an accident, etc.

Overall though, health care should not be tied to your employment.

> Overall though, health care should not be tied to your employment.

Yes, I agree.

> So you're paying for most normal medical expenses out of pocket, and your insurance plan is basically a backstop for if you get cancer, have an accident, etc.

That's literally what insurance is supposed to be: a financial mechanism for smoothing risk. The actuarial price for insurance on routine events will be exactly the same as paying for those routine events directly.

Economically and financially, "insurance" is explicitly not supposed to cover predictable, routine costs, because there is no risk associated with them. It is a really terrible and unfortunate misnomer that we call this "insurance", because it's not. You wouldn't expect your collision insurance to cover your annual DMV fees.

If you want normal, routine medical expenses to be priced below cost, then you're talking about a subsidy. But a subsidy is not insurance. Insurance pools money from at-risk parties. A subsidy is a transfer of wealth.

To be honest, it's perfectly fine to advocate that if that's what you really want, but it's misleading to call this "insurance", because it serves a completely different goal (wealth transfer vs. risk pooling).

> Not only that, but this whole health plan debate is weird for those of us in high deductible HSA plans.

Yes, and don't forget about the foregone tax savings from having an HSA account in the first place (which this site does not take into account).

This site is a great example of how incomplete information can be misleading. For most people reading this site, the bulk of the impact would not be from the income tax or the health insurance costs, but the secondary impact that Sanders's plans would have on their other assets.

If health insurance goes single payer you stop putting money into your (presumably) now non-existent HSA and start paying it in medicare taxes. Depending on how the rates end up you might end up paying more or less. I mean that's the end result no matter what your current insurance situation is: you might end up paying more or less. Thats also true no matter what happens in the election or what happens to the ACA. There is no law anyone can pass/get passed that will absolutely guarantee every individual in the US has an equal or higher effective take home in 2020.

FWIW, my employer's high-deductible plan comes out a wash because my daughter has an allergy. On high-deductible plans prescription drug coverage is verboten and consequently EpiPens cost $350 and you have to buy at lest two pair (one set for home and one set for the elementary school nurse) rather than $0 (manufacturer coupon designed for prescription plans). So... yes you save the $1k in premiums but all your drugs come out of the higher $4k deductible (vs being limited to $75 yearly deductible + copay).

  it makes it nearly impossible for even things like startups to thrive.

Income tax is a tax on personal, individual income and should have no impact on startups.

In fact startups wouldn't have to worry about the cost of providing healthcare benefits and people wouldn't opt to not work for a startup, due to lack of healthcare.

If you want to focus on things that hurt startups, focus on the lack of investors outside Silicon Vally.

> Income tax is a tax on personal, individual income and should have no impact on startups.

No, just because a tax is levied on individuals doesn't mean the effects of the tax are limited to individuals.

(In fact, just because a tax is levied on one party doesn't even mean that party is the one really paying for it, in the end! This is the concept of tax incidence, which determines the entities who really feel the burden of any individual tax, independently of where it's collected).

My point is that listing personal income tax as something that startups have to worry about is a disingenuous argument at best. If you're going to try to play the 'all taxes affect everyone' argument then we must also consider the lower net-burden on employees within that startup from the single payer system (among many other externalities or incidences).

Bernie will also increase capital gains taxes. This lowers the effective return on investment. This might make the risk of investing in start ups too great. Plus a lot of VC money comes from rich and upper middle class people in investing.

And more than a few start ups cater to upper middle class folks with cash to burn.

The 6.2% health care premium currently slated to be paid by employers would have an impact on startups.

See this. This is bernie's official website page that lists the ways he plans to pay for his proposals.

https://berniesanders.com/issues/how-bernie-pays-for-his-pro...

A giant [citation required] is needed for your comment, but outside of that, taking this single claim at face value:

    I heard him in an interview that the upper federal tax bracket will be 55%. This combined with state and local taxes means it will be closer to 75% (not including sales tax and countless other taxes that are paid).

    It's just like in Norway and Sweden (the countries he wants to emulate). On paper, it looks like a small amount. But when it actually comes down to it, it makes it nearly impossible for even things like startups to thrive.

I'm wondering how many startup founders and employees you think are anywhere near the top tax bracket and would be negatively impacted.

> only come from 'greedy wallstreet executives'

Not an executive of any kind and can barely afford to raise one kid in a tiny apartment in NYC. According to this calculator, under Bernie's tax plan I will have pay more tax equivalent to one month of disposable income.

So yeah, it's almost certain that whatever Bernie promised, will be, as it always be, paid by the upper middle class.

Have you actually read the data? Your statement is just absurd - the 55% rate is for people who make TEN MILLION DOLLARS a year.

Please (re)read the HN guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. Comments like "have you actually read", "your statement is just absurd", and "You're incredibly ignorant" (a recent one) are what they ask you not to do. They also ask you not to use uppercase for emphasis. Putting all that together and applying it to your comment, we can shorten it to:

The 55% rate is for people who make ten million dollars a year.

... which (if true) is a fine and factual comment for HN.

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