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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

GOP Healthcare Bill, Panned by Docs, Cuts Taxes for Wealthy

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Wednesday, June 21, 2017   

RICHMOND, Va. - Virginia millionaires could see an average tax cut of close to $40,000 a year if the American Health Care Act becomes law, according to a new analysis. Those tax cuts would be paid for in part by removing more than 500,000 Virginians from health-insurance rolls.

Alan Essig, executive director of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, said Congressional Budget Office figures show the health bill that cleared the U.S. House is less about health policy than tax breaks for the top 3 percent of U.S. earners.

"The end result is 23 million people losing health-care coverage," he said. "The reason for that is to pay for $660 billion worth of tax cuts that overwhelmingly go to the wealthiest Americans."

Supporters of the AHCA have said cuts to Medicaid and reversing the program's expansion would reduce the federal deficit and lower health-care costs. The U.S. Senate has not yet made its version of the health bill public, but close observers say it closely resembles the House version.

The bill is opposed by the American Medical Association and American Nursing Association. Essig said the majority of Medicaid recipients that could be affected are older folks and people with disabilities, pregnant women and children. He warned that bankruptcies due to medical bills, which have decreased under Obamacare, could be back on the rise.

"Real people will end up losing their health-care coverage, and that will impact people's health, people's lives and people's bank books," he said. "We're going to be going back to where we were, which I don't think is where anyone wants to go."

Under the Affordable Care Act, low- and moderate-income Americans have been able to get coverage due in part to a tax on individuals making more than $200,000 a year, or $250,000 for couples filing jointly. Essig said insurance premiums for an average 64-year-old with an income of $27,000 would rise from $1,700 to more than $16,000 a year.

The analysis is online at americanprogressaction.org.


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