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Until quite recently, most insurances would not carry a young adult dependent who was not a full time student. My own daughter had to go off our insurance when she graduated from college in August of 2009, just a month after she turned 22. COBRA was going to be $500/mo. She found a short term policy until she got a job that provided insurance.
That's my point. If the person picked up insurance immediately there would be no lapse in insurance and no preexisting condition. Why was there a lapse in insurance?
Also, in NY a minor is allowed to remain on their parents plan until 29. When our company got taken over by a California company and our insurance was base in Calif. the age was changed to 26 and 2 dependents were dropped.
In my case, my parents lost COBRA after long term unemployment shortly before I graduated from college. As I said, I was quoted $600 at the cheapest if I wasn't flat out denied coverage. I was job hunting full time and was lucky to find a job in 4 months that offered insurance, but would never have been able to survive that expense as an unemployed person with only babysitting for income. Even had I been working a service job in the meantime, that would have been impossible to afford. Not "cut internet and smart phone" level but "can't pay rent" level - and that would be assuming I could find more than one low paying job. I struggled to even find one.
Until quite recently, most insurances would not carry a young adult dependent who was not a full time student. My own daughter had to go off our insurance when she graduated from college in August of 2009, just a month after she turned 22. COBRA was going to be $500/mo. She found a short term policy until she got a job that provided insurance.
That's my point. If the person picked up insurance immediately there would be no lapse in insurance and no preexisting condition. Why was there a lapse in insurance?
Also, in NY a minor is allowed to remain on their parents plan until 29. When our company got taken over by a California company and our insurance was base in Calif. the age was changed to 26 and 2 dependents were dropped.
Who knows why this guy had no insurance before? In Colorado, there was no law whatsover requiring insurance companies to keep dependents on the policies after 18. It was up to the individual insurance company, depending on what they negotiated with the company. My spouse's company did negotiate that a dependent could stay on the employee's policy until 25 if a full time student. My daughter had to be dropped when she graduated at age 22. No law protected her. COBRA would have been $500/month. If it hadn't been for a chance conversation with a guy from our church who is an insurance agent, we wouldn't have known what to do in regards to a short term policy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TrapperJohn
It's not hard. Go to the IRS website. Download the taxpayer stat file. It's in Excel. There are numerous websites that have taken the data and put it into charts. The majority of taxes, including payroll taxes, are paid by the top earners. The often-quoted statistic that half of Americans don't pay taxes is derived from this data set.
Payroll taxes. Everyone pays them. On the back end, millions of families receive refundable tax credits - both Earned Income and Child Tax Credits. This offsets their payroll tax liability. In the IRS data set you will note that the lowest quintile of returns has a negative effective tax rate. They received back more than they paid in. Side note: the EIC and expanded child credit were the largest portion of the Bush tax cuts.
Look at the federal budget. Income from all sources is disclosed. The income tax data ties to the IRS data.
Expenses are disclosed in detail by department. The social programs consume 100% of receipts. The rich pay the majority of the receipts that are collected. Everything else is funded with borrowed dollars. That means if we didn't borrow money, we wouldn't have a defense budget.
Every time in our history that we have had a surplus, which results in the repayment of those borrowed funds, the rich were the source of the income. That makes sense - poor people don't borrow money, and cant repay it when they do. Think housing crisis.
By default, the rich pay for defense. The lowest income workers get subsidized. The middle quintile pays taxes, but at an effective rate much smaller than the rich.
I was part of a think tank group once. They asked business owners like me for ideas. I would take the lowest earners off the tax rolls completely. A flat payroll tax at some level, with no tax return filing requirement. In fact, I'd take 75% of America off the rolls. Handle it all via payroll taxes and a small national sales tax. As a business owner, I'd support a single-payer system that was also funded via payroll taxes.
The government doesn't want that. They like the bureaucracy and hubris. The IRS employs 100,000 GS-10's. More importantly, it gives them a mechanism to distribute welfare checks disguised as tax refunds.
I'll be dipped if I'm going to do that. YOU made the assertion that the rich pay 100% of the cost of defense. YOU prove it or it's false in my book.
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 01-03-2012 at 11:32 AM..
Reason: Fix other poster's mistake with quotes
Sometimes I wonder if it truly is worth working as hard as one can and being as responsible as you can. Between sudsidized housing, welfare, unemployment benefits, larger college financial aid, and subsidized insurance, I wonder what the the true dollar value of being underemployed is?
Sometimes being as hard working and responsible as you can still doesn't cut it. Situations beyond your control still happen, leaving even the most prepared with little or no option.
I'll be dipped if I'm going to do that. YOU made the assertion that the rich pay 100% of the cost of defense. YOU prove it or it's false in my book.
Then you are not serious about learning the truth. I don't listen to Rush or Olberman or any of those talking heads because I like to research the issue for myself.
On the other hand, nothing I told you really requires a link. It's known fact.
The receipts are $2 trillion from all sources. Social programs are $2 trillion. The deficit was $1.5 trillion or close to it. That basic information proves my point if you were to think of it logically and from a macro perspective.
If you choose to believe its false, that is your right.
Sometimes being as hard working and responsible as you can still doesn't cut it. Situations beyond your control still happen, leaving even the most prepared with little or no option.
True. I'm not sure why some people are so obsessed with preventing someone who does not make as much money as they do from getting any type of assistance, to the point that they can't see this until it happens to them.
People wo have a few thousand in the bank are talking about how they work hard and save money, and that they would be able to pay their own way, when in fact, the reality is that when someone has a terminal illness, healthcare costs can go into the hundreds of thousands. The average American is not capable of saving this amount. Because they haven't experienced it, they can't relate. Yet the same individuals don't bat an eyelash when the government spends on war or corporate welfare.
True. I'm not sure why some people are so obsessed with preventing someone who does not make as much money as they do from getting any type of assistance, to the point that they can't see this until it happens to them.
People wo have a few thousand in the bank are talking about how they work hard and save money, and that they would be able to pay their own way, when in fact, the reality is that when someone has a terminal illness, healthcare costs can go into the hundreds of thousands. The average American is not capable of saving this amount. Because they haven't experienced it, they can't relate. Yet the same individuals don't bat an eyelash when the government spends on war or corporate welfare.
Unfortunately, provision of health care has been tied to employment for so long, that I've come to believe that people view it solely as a benefit of their employment. They've convinced themselves that they and others like them are only entitled to health care coverage if they are employed, hard-working, and whatever else they tell themselves to prove that they are worthy of this 'golden ticket.'
They simply cannot conceive of any other way.
Then you are not serious about learning the truth. I don't listen to Rush or Olberman or any of those talking heads because I like to research the issue for myself.
On the other hand, nothing I told you really requires a link. It's known fact.
The receipts are $2 trillion from all sources. Social programs are $2 trillion. The deficit was $1.5 trillion or close to it. That basic information proves my point if you were to think of it logically and from a macro perspective.
If you choose to believe its false, that is your right.
It is untrue that "the rich" pay 100% of the costs for the military. No matter how many times you say so, it's not true.
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