SCOTUS Healthcare Ruling

[David2012]

Read a interesting point this morning...

If Obamacare is a 'tax' this Health Care bill would be for raising revenue. As such it should have originated in The House, not the Senate? This bill originated in the Senate and was deemed to Pass by the House since it was not a Tax. The House never voted on it. Would that invalidate it?

 

[AKguy1985]

This is a bunch of crap IMHO.

 

[Mustang Armory, LLC]

buy more ammo

 

[Street Rat]

Read a interesting point this morning...

If Obamacare is a 'tax' this Health Care bill would be for raising revenue. As such it should have originated in The House, not the Senate? This is bill originated in the Senate and was deemed to Pass by the House since it was not a Tax. The House never voted on it. Would that invalidate it?

Someone like me would think that, a stealth tax flying in under the radar. Let's do it again and see if it passes as a tax, but we know that's never going to happen. I think just by the backroom deals that were made to pass this thing should have nullified it, but again, that's just me and apparently, they can do these kind of things.

After reading the opinion of the court, I get it. Some part of me acknowledges that they made the right call. Personally, I'm happy that the SCOTUS shot down the commerce clause argument and called the individual mandate a tax. They are correct that the Constitution does allow for taxation to encourage economic behavior. I don't like it, but they're right. If tax incentives can be given for getting married or buying a house, then they can be used the other way as well. I think they did well in calling a spade a spade. It's a new tax. We all know how popular new taxes are when it comes time for an election. I'm also happy that they struck down the ability to coerce states into signing on to the expansion by threatening the withholding of all medicaid funds if they didn't. It wouldn't surprise me to see a lot of states bow out of this one in the long term. A lot of states will probably find it fiscally unsustainable.

If it's a tax that is good for this country, what can we expect to be taxed on next? The type of car you buy or don't buy, a tax for not having solar panels for your house, or having too big of a house because it might make those with smaller houses feel bad. With this decision, it's just going to enbolden these people to think they can just do whatever they want, and God I hope I'm wrong, but I have a feeling were going to have same guy in the White House after November regardless of what the ruling on obamacare was yesterday. Just get ready, we're going to have a long road ahead of us to our graves, we'll maybe not as long as before obamacare.

 

[inactive]

Read a interesting point this morning...

If Obamacare is a 'tax' this Health Care bill would be for raising revenue. As such it should have originated in The House, not the Senate? This is bill originated in the Senate and was deemed to Pass by the House since it was not a Tax. The House never voted on it. Would that invalidate it?

The Affordable Health Care for America Act (or HR 3962)[1] was a bill that was crafted by the United States House of Representatives in November 2009. At the encouragement of the Obama administration, the 111th Congress devoted much of its time to enacting reform of the United States' health care system. Known as the "House bill," it was the House of Representative's chief legislative proposal during the health reform debate, but the Affordable Health Care for America Act as originally drafted never became law.

On December 24, 2009, the Senate passed an alternative health care bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (H.R. 3590).[2] In 2010, the House abandoned its reform bill in favor of amending the Senate bill (via the reconciliation process) in the form of the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

It passed the House of Representatives on March 21, 2010, by a vote of 219–212, with 34 Democrats and all 178 Republicans voting against the bill.

It as it exists today was passed by the house as PPACA after the Senate passed it first. So yea, law-making process is funkier than old moldy cheese, but this still ends up legit because the PPACA (HR 3590) was an iteration/variation of the The Affordable Health Care for America Act (HR 3962). By technicality perhaps, it started in the House as HR 3962.

 

[inactive]

Not really. There was for all intents and purposes no middle-class before WWII. The returning soldiers spurred a housing boom, baby boom, billions of dollars in war bonds matured at once, a permanent war manufacturing economy was established, the G.I. Bill trained millions of G.I.'s for well paid jobs which spurred city and suburban growth, the Interstate Highway Act and automobile-based industries exploded onto the scene, the tax rate was beneficial to paying off the debt, etc.

Eisenhower was mentioned earlier - it should be noted that he supported drastically different economic policies than the average Republican today. Hell, so did Nixon. What we see today is pretty young and owes its roots to Reaganomics.

The debt incurred from WWII was leveled quickly as a result of WWII itself. Your "bootstrap" generation had an unprecedented amount of help pulling those boots on. Economically speaking, I'd argue the parents of the greatest generation had the toughest time with their boots. The greatest generation got TV sets, '55 Chevys, air conditioning, and fully pensioned on-time retirement for blue-collar work.

I'd disagree with with that. He continued FDR's programs, expanded social security, and vehemently opposed reducing tax rates that would get him lynched on OSA. Like Hobbes said, take into account the (corporate) tax rate in that era.

The quickness to bash our generation for our economic expectations, by our own peers, is funny to me. Myself and none of my peers I know expect to be able to have anywhere close to the lifestyle our grandparents had with the same education and same type of employment. What's a pension? What's a labor union? (unions were booming in the 50's, funny the bootstrap generation thrived off of what today's Republicans blame every evil of the world on - bootstrap folks shouldn't need unions...right?), what's a pension plan? You mean work pays you AFTER you quit? Get outta here. What's 40 years and a gold watch?

Our generation sucks for many reasons, but we certainly aren't dealing with a drastically cushier economic reality than the baby boomers or their parents (post-WWII family starters) faced. I don't feel "entitled" to any of the things people 50 years ago took for granted - because they don't exist anymore.

Ridge,

I still give a lot of credit to The Greatest Generation.

The Baby Boomers grew up with parents who drove'55 Chevys with air conditioning, worked blue and white collar jobs that gave them pensions and benefits, color TVs and automatic clothes washers. They weren't spoiled, they survived the second World War, the Great Depression, and worked hard to get though it. They remember the poverty and rebuilding it took. They remember helping each other, Ike's high tax rates to pay off the war debt and build roads and infrastructure. My grandparents were possibly the most compassionate Democrats and also champions of personal responsibility I ever knew.

The Baby Boomers grew up with this affluence, these niceties, but I'm not so sure they studied the toil and hardship their parents went through to get there. They want to claim things like Social Security and Medicare because they paid into them all their life, but they don't want it to go forward from there. They want to gripe about the state of roads and traffic and construction, but they are bitter anytime a bond issue comes to vote or federal stimulus money is being directed to fixed bridges and interstates. They gripe that people should pay their own way and borrow to attend college, but forget that their parents paid taxes enough that tuition rates were far more affordable back when they attended. I sure know a lot of 'boomers who want to accept all that was left for them, but leave nothing for the generations that follow.

So the Greatest Generation had a lot of help and programs in their later years, but they were the ones who primarily built and funded those systems. I concede the post-war boom sure helped, but they and their politicians sure as hell could have squandered it (as happened with the late 90s economic boom).

 

[Hobbes]

It's also the generation that conquered polio and smallpox and sent men to the moon(conspiracy theorists can ignore that one if you like).

But doing that, as well as building the interstate highway system required a lot of investing in the future.
Now days not too many people believe in that outdated concept anymore.
Now days the "future" is the next election cycle.

That's why I don't think our future is as bright as our past.

 

[RidgeHunter]

Ridge,

I still give a lot of credit to The Greatest Generation.

The Baby Boomers grew up with parents who drove'55 Chevys with air conditioning, worked blue and white collar jobs that gave them pensions and benefits, color TVs and automatic clothes washers. They weren't spoiled, they survived the second World War, the Great Depression, and worked hard to get though it. They remember the poverty and rebuilding it took. They remember helping each other, Ike's high tax rates to pay off the war debt and build roads and infrastructure. My grandparents were possibly the most compassionate Democrats and also champions of personal responsibility I ever knew.

The Baby Boomers grew up with this affluence, these niceties, but I'm not so sure they studied the toil and hardship their parents went through to get there. They want to claim things like Social Security and Medicare because they paid into them all their life, but they don't want it to go forward from there. They want to gripe about the state of roads and traffic and construction, but they are bitter anytime a bond issue comes to vote or federal stimulus money is being directed to fixed bridges and interstates. They gripe that people should pay their own way and borrow to attend college, but forget that their parents paid taxes enough that tuition rates were far more affordable back when they attended. I sure know a lot of 'boomers who want to accept all that was left for them, but leave nothing for the generations that follow.

So the Greatest Generation had a lot of help and programs in their later years, but they were the ones who primarily built and funded those systems. I concede the post-war boom sure helped, but they and their politicians sure as hell could have squandered it (as happened with the late 90s economic boom).

I don't take anything away from the WWII generation, and I often bash my generation and praise theirs for certain qualities the possess that my generation and baby boomers lack.

I'm simply saying the constant bashing of my generation in one area, financial expectations/employment, is out of whack and it's old hat. I have a split family, one half Okie dirt-farming Democrats, and the other half from back east. The back east grandparents were part of the WWII boys coming home and bought a new house in a Levittown addition and raised 3 kids on a single income (manufacturing work). A nice lifestyle for an entire family with a single blue-collar income was the norm for a while in America. Pensions were the norm. Union membership was high.

The Okie half of my family also raised three kids with jobs/educations and maintained a lifestyle that would be very difficult to maintain in 2012 with the same jobs/education (both parents worked, tho). All their kids had a chance to go to college. They grew up dirt poor before the war. They never had a cushy lifestyle at all, but raised families in a way that would not be feasible if the situation was transferred to 2012. They were never close to having spare money, and busted their ass more than anyone I've ever known, but they did receive rewards for it that aren't achievable today.

All I'm saying is it's objectively not drastically easier - and IMO it's likely more difficult in certain ways - to maintain a "middle class lifestyle" with the same skills/education/jobs than it was in the 50's and 60's. Of course like anything economic, this is highly complicated and depends on many variables, like COL in certain areas of the country, etc, etc.

The greatest generation grew up poor, sacrificed ridiculous amount both for the war effort and for the prosperity that followed as you lay out, but objectively, when they came back and started popping out babies around 1950...they weren't comparatively scratching and surviving for any employment to feed the kids in contrast to my generation pissing a silver employment platter.

Good luck raising three kids in a new house with new cars on a single blue-collar income and sending them to college and retiring at 65 with a pension today. My generation deserves a lot of bashing, but in the employment arena only, the "entitled" BS is getting old. We don't expect a damn thing employment wise. No pensions and the smart ones don't expect social security to pay for a bag of rice when we're old. I don't expect to send 3 kids to college working in a factory. Entitled my ass.

 

[WhiteyMacD]

The future is already the past... and still no hover boards. I would be happy to pay taxes if I could get a Pit Bull Hoverboard.

 

[Hobbes]

Pension? What is this "pension" you speak of?