whose health do we insure?

The second I heard about Bush's health insurance tax plan on Monday I was incensed. I can only imagine him sitting there thinking, "How can we create a diversion for the skyrocketing cost of health care that looks like we're helping the uninsured but instead penalizes a lot of other people?" Of course I'm kidding, we know he couldn't construct that sentence (as rambling as it was), but some of his advisers might be able to help with it.

The last sentence in the article I've linked you to above sums it up:
"We're tilting the playing field toward this very flawed market," said Robert D. Reischauer, president of the Urban Institute.

If you tax people who receive health benefits from employers, you're undermining this very effective and generous system (relatively speaking). Considering this country is never going to give us affordable universal coverage (can you blame them when the private system makes dollars hands over fist and then gets to include these figures in the GDP?), all we've got is that firms offer these benefits to their workers. The plans that large firms can acquire from health insurance companies are so much better than anything anyone could buy individually (you'd think these capitalists would know that). Plus, if you work for a large enough firm, they cover you wholly at the same rate as everyone else in your firm, even if you have certain pre-existing conditions other insurance plans wouldn't allow (or you'd pay insanely high premiums). I'd basically be screwed if the employer-insurance system collapsed.

Read the article. It's the best thing I've seen yet against the plan.