Is this healthcare?
Close Tax Loopholes. Adopts two House proposals to close tax loopholes: (1) Current law provides a tax credit for the production of cellulosic biofuels. The credit was designed to promote the production and use of renewable fuels. Certain liquid byproducts derived from processing paper or pulp (known as “black liquor” when derived from the kraft process) were not intended to be covered by this credit. The President’s Proposal adopts the House bill’s policy to clarify that they are not eligible for the tax credit. (2) The President’s Proposal helps prevent unjustified tax shelters by clarifying the circumstances under which transactions have “economic substance” (as opposed to being undertaken solely to obtain tax benefits) and raises the penalties for transactions that lack economic substance. In so doing, it adopts the House’s policy, with minor technical changes.
By the time anyone reads this, they will doubtless have already found out that the key reforms proposed by the Republicans have not, contrary to the rhetoric on WhiteHouse.gov, been included in President Obama's new plan; although this a bit hard to pin down given the disjointed way in which the material is presented.
But, I think the paragraph quoted above may be more instructive of the mindset of the administration. This paragraph deals with two rather obscure provisions of the tax code which have nothing to do with healthcare. Why are they here and taking up so much of the little space given to explaining this new version of the plan?
The second part - abusive tax shelters - is almost amusing. It says the government is going to crack down on tax shelter activities that are undertaken "solely to obtain tax benefits" rather than for their "economic substance." But all "preferences" in the tax code - and they are legion - are there to steer the behavior of taxpayers. Does anyone rmember the Cash for Clunkers program this same administration touted so highly last year?
posted by J. Keen Holland @ 1:41 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
Yes, laws and policies have intent. That's not particuarly interesting. It doesn't take that much intellectual curiosity to imagine a tax-credit that invites unintended, negative impacts in conflict with policy intent (often true of any policy, tax-related or not). But I don't get your point -- I read the background to this abusive use of a tax policy (which I agree is probably dumb to begin with) but tightening up a policy that's being actively abused for no good purpose is a worthy thing. I don't see how you could be opposed to it, especially since you haven't even bothered to research what it's about specifically. Google is your friend. You don't have to be ignorant, or is that deliberate?
Sorry to hear you say "But I don't get your point" because I thought it was fairly obvious. I was pointing out that these provisions (a) had nothing to do with healthcare, and (b) that it was odd the WhiteHouse.gov materials on the healthcare bill should devote this much space to extraneous matter in the proposal given the relatively little space given over to discussing the parts of the bill that actually related to healthcare.
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