House Republicans referred to those potential recipients with their six figures in earnings as “middle income.”
If the Obamacare replacement bill had come forward (and become law) without any income caps on the health insurance tax credits, there was a good chance
that employers would have stopped offering insurance to millions of employees.
Instead, it’s a question that is as much moral as it is fiscal: If health is our highest priority, then shouldn’t we commit to paying for it by reallocating the tax breaks accordingly, so
that more people get more of them when they are trying to afford insurance?
When a draft of the bill leaked late last month, it looked as though everyone who didn’t get health
insurance from an employer or government program would get a tax credit to help buy coverage.
Encouraging homeownership, meanwhile, is probably a higher priority than the fat tax breaks
that higher income people can take advantage of with 529 college savings plans (though there was a near-revolt two years ago when President Barack Obama tried to mess with that system.)