Are You Ready To Have The IRS & DMV Involved In Your Health Care?

by John Hawkins | October 14, 2009 12:22 pm

Everything the government gets involved with inevitably turns into a horrific mess. Think FEMA and Katrina. Think ICE and the border. Think about the Post Office vs. Fed Ex or UPS. Think about our nation’s budget and Medicare. Think housing projects. Think welfare. Think about the economic crisis we’re in right now — the one that was caused by the government policies that led to bad loans being given to people who wouldn’t pay them back.

Now, think of health care — in all honesty, a lot of the problems were already:  there as a direct result of government intervention. Insurance agencies aren’t allowed to compete across state lines, trial lawyers are allowed to use the system like a piggy bank, and all of us are paying more because Medicare and Medicaid doesn’t fully reimburse doctors for their services.

The government solution to this? More government.

In fact, you have to wonder if Americans realize how much more government agencies they already don’t like are going to be involved in their lives if this health care bill passes.

For example, do you really want the IRS more intimately involved in handling your health care[1]?

Over 30 new federal programs, agencies, and commissions would be required to administer the massive new health-care entitlement. Obamacare would establish a “Health Choices Administration” to dictate what your insurance plan can and cannot cover and a “Health Benefits Advisory Committee” to guide these “choices.” And if the government decides your choices are not acceptable, Obamacare gives the Internal Revenue Service the power to levy substantial fines against you. An overlooked ramification is that the IRS would have to coordinate with the Health Choices Commissioner and whatever other officials are deemed necessary to decide whether your coverage meets the government’s minimum standard. That means the IRS will be sharing your tax records with Obama’s health czars, who could use them in new and intrusive ways. As Byron York has reported, one version of Obamacare (there are five or six floating around Capitol Hill) envisions the use of tax records to “find qualifying seniors who can then be encouraged to enroll in the [Medicare] prescription drug program.” By filing your tax return, you could be signing up for government junk mail – or worse.

How does the idea of buying your health insurance at the DMV strike you[2]?

The most revelatory passage in the so-called “plain English” version of the health care bill that the Senate Finance Committee approved on Tuesday (without ever drafting the actual legislative language) says that in the future Americans will be offered the convenience of getting their health insurance at the Department of Motor Vehicles.

This is no joke. If this bill becomes law, it will be the duty of the U.S. secretary of health and human services or the state governments overseeing federally mandated health-insurance exchanges to ensure that you can get your health insurance at the DMV.

You also will be able to get it at Social Security offices, hospitals, schools and “other offices” the government will name later.

Page 19 of the committee’s “plain English” text says: “The Secretary and/or states would do the following: … Enable customers to enroll in health care plans in local hospitals, schools, Departments of Motor Vehicles, local Social Security offices, and other offices designated by the state.”

You don’t like your insurance company? Understandable. But, do you really think you’re going to like dealing with government bureaucrats at places like the IRS and DMV better? Really?

Endnotes:
  1. IRS more intimately involved in handling your health care: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MGVmMjNjNmExMzUyMGZiY2ZiNDgzM2RjMGMxNDgzNmI=&w=MQ==
  2. buying your health insurance at the DMV strike you: http://cnsnews.com/news/article/55450

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