May We Call President Obama A Socialist Now?

I don’t know why Democrats are so touchy about the description. Well, some, like Al Sharpton isn’t. Their motivation is “fairness” which means to take from one person and give to another who hasn’t earned it. From the New York Times:

A big chunk of the money to pay for the bill comes from lifting payroll taxes on households making more than $250,000. On average, the annual tax bill for households making more than $1 million a year will rise by $46,000 in 2013, according to the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research group. Another major piece of financing would cut Medicare subsidies for private insurers, ultimately affecting their executives and shareholders.

The benefits, meanwhile, flow mostly to households making less than four times the poverty level – $88,200 for a family of four people. Those without insurance in this group will become eligible to receive subsidies or to join Medicaid. (Many of the poor are already covered by Medicaid.) Insurance costs are also likely to drop for higher-income workers at small companies.

Finally, the bill will also reduce a different kind of inequality. In the broadest sense, insurance is meant to spread the costs of an individual’s misfortune – illness, death, fire, flood – across society. Since the late 1970s, though, the share of Americans with health insurance has shrunk. As a result, the gap between the economic well-being of the sick and the healthy has been growing, at virtually every level of the income distribution.

The health reform bill will reverse that trend. By 2019, 95 percent of people are projected to be covered, up from 85 percent today (and about 90 percent in the late 1970s). Even affluent families ineligible for subsidies will benefit if they lose their insurance, by being able to buy a plan that can no longer charge more for pre-existing conditions. In effect, healthy families will be picking up most of the bill – and their insurance will be somewhat more expensive than it otherwise would have been.

Each according to his need. Enforced fairness.

What is the natural consequence of such actions? The rich make sure they are no longer rich. By any means necessary, they will make sure their income falls below the taxation threshold. A whole new industry will pop up to help rich people. And rich people will go buy health care somewhere else. They can afford to travel to Mexico after all, to get cheaper health care. And the cost of health care in America will rise from this legislation.

And then, the government will have to force people to pay more taxes, which is why the President is considering a VAT tax. This whole issue will spiral. Costs will increase, tax revenue will decline. The black market for everything will flourish.

The incentives are all wrong. Why should people quit smoking and eat right? Pay the fine for not having insurance and then buy insurance when you get sick.

Socialism never works because it fundamentally operates against human nature. It reinforces bad behavior and extinguishes good behavior.

But it’s “fair.”

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