The Supreme Court, once again, holds the fate of the Affordable Care Act in its hands. The first challenge to the law involved significant constitutional questions. This time, not so much.

The latest challenge, King v. Burwell, does not raise important constitutional issues -- the ACA was already ruled constitutional. However, the potential impact could do real damage. Millions of Americans could lose insurance coverage, premiums would increase dramatically -- making insurance unaffordable for many in the individual market -- and hospitals would lose funding for uncompensated care. Historic changes that have made affordable health care accessible to more Americans would be erased.

From the beginning, the ACA has been the focus of a hard-fought battle between opposing ideologies and political parties.

A quick recap: The act passed in the Senate and House on party-line votes. To avoid a filibuster after the Massachusetts special Senate election in 2010, Democrats resorted to a little-used process known as "reconciliation" to push the legislation into law. Since then, the House of Representatives has voted 54 times to repeal all or part of the law and in 2013 actually shut down the federal government for 16 days to block its funding. Every House budget proposal since 2011 has contained a provision to repeal the law.

In 2015, the ACA is still on the front line of that political fight. According to March's Kaiser Health Policy Tracking Poll, 74 percent of Republicans have an unfavorable opinion of the ACA. Alternatively, 65 percent of Democrats have a favorable opinion.

Given this political divide, amending or revising the law in Congress is all but impossible, and the near-term fate of the law is once again up to the Supreme Court. The first time the court ruled on the health care law was in March 2012.

Whether you love or hate the ACA, at least the first Supreme Court case involved significant constitutional issues.

In NFIB v. Sebelius, the issue before the court was whether the federal government could force American citizens to purchase a private product, in this case health insurance. The law's drafters argued that Congress had the power to do so under the Constitution's Commerce Clause -- as a matter of interstate commerce. In its ruling, the Supreme Court held that the ACA's individual mandate was not justified under the Commerce Clause but that it could be implemented under Congress' power to tax.

The second issue, in Florida v. HHS, was whether the government could force individual states to expand Medicaid by threatening to cut off all of a state's Medicaid funding if they refused. The core of the debate was whether the threatened budget cut was "unconstitutionally coercive" to individual states. By a vote of 7-2, the Supreme Court decided that this provision of the ACA was, in fact, a bridge too far.

Both issues raised constitutional questions that involved potential precedents and lawmaking.

Unlike the cases in 2012, there are no great constitutional issues at stake in King v. Burwell. The challenge is strictly about the ACA and will probably have no real importance for future laws, federalism or constitutional precedent. It is about one phrase -- "established by the state" -- repeated 10 times in the 2,000-page law.

The petitioners in King v. Burwell claim that because of that phrase, the ACA's drafters intended to provide insurance subsidies only to those states that set up their own insurance exchanges. They claim that the language was an obvious attempt by Congress to coerce states into setting up marketplaces.

However, there is no evidence that states felt they were being coerced. No states raised public objections based on the idea that subsidies would be restricted to state-based exchanges. No state filed a regulatory or legal challenge. Nor was there any attempt by Congress or the administration to force the IRS, which manages the subsidies, to stick to a coercive game plan.

On top of everything else, if the petitioner's interpretation of the law is correct, then more than 50 other provisions in the law would be unworkable. If the key phrase was sprinkled into the law to coerce states into setting up their own marketplaces, it failed on all counts.

In comparison, the provision on Medicaid expansion left nothing to chance. If a state did not expand Medicaid, Congress had the option to slash federal funding. Congress indicated its willingness to do so, and the states clearly recognized the threat. Twenty-six states took the legal challenge all the way to the Supreme Court. Not one state joined King v. Burwell.

In the King case, the petitioner's claim of harm is about as tenuous as the claim of congressional coercion. They claim that the federal subsidies are so generous that they can no longer qualify for a hardship exemption from the mandate to buy insurance. In other words, the subsidies would make health insurance too affordable to exempt them from buying insurance.

It makes one wonder whether this case truly has merit or is just the latest manifestation of the long effort to kill or wound the law. In an opinion piece in the New Yorker, writer Jeffrey Toobin cited a 2010 statement from Michael Greve, a board member of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which brought the King case to court. "This bastard (referring to the Affordable Care Act) has to be killed as a matter of political hygiene. I do not care how this is done, whether it's dismembered, whether we drive a stake through its heart, whether we tar and feather it and drive it out of town, whether we strangle it."

Even though the King case appears to be motivated by political ideology and its claims frivolous, a ruling in favor of the petitioners would have very real and harmful consequences for millions of Americans. More than 7 million Americans in states with federal exchanges currently receive subsidies to purchase coverage. If those individuals lost access to subsidies, the cost of coverage would be unaffordable for the vast majority of them. According to the Commonwealth Fund, a subsidy shutdown could result in 9.6 million fewer people with coverage by 2016, a 70 percent decline. The resulting adverse selection caused by healthy people leaving the risk pool could increase insurance premiums in the individual market by 47 percent.

Health care providers and health insurers would be hit especially hard if newly insured patients suddenly or even gradually lost coverage. Hospital Corporation of America, the largest for-profit hospital chain in the U.S., reports that it collects zero payment from nearly 90 percent of its uninsured patients. Health insurers could see a 70 percent decline in enrollment. The loss of a healthier risk pool would create unprecedented premium price growth, and insurers leaving the marketplace would create an even more uncompetitive insurance market.

Five years after the ACA was signed into law, it is delivering good results. There are problems with the law, to be sure. Among other changes, Congress could fix the "established by the state" wording with a single amendment. But with our current political dysfunction, that is virtually impossible.

Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid -- each a sprawling, landmark piece of legislation -- went through similar legislative and legal challenges for both political and ideological reasons. Those laws were ultimately modified and made better through legislative amendment and regulation. One day, that same basic function of legislating will be what's required to make changes to the Affordable Care Act. Unless the Supreme Court deals it a crippling blow in June. Reported by Huffington Post 7 hours ago.

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Affordablemedicareinsurance.com is an online provider of life, home, health, and auto insurance quotes. This website is unique because it does not simply stick to one kind of insurance provider, but brings the clients the best deals from many different online insurance carriers. In this way, clients have access to offers from multiple carriers all in one place: this website. On this site, customers have access to quotes for insurance plans from various agencies, such as local or nationwide agencies, brand names insurance companies, etc.

Affordablemedicareinsurance.com is owned by Internet Marketing Company.

For more information, please visit http://www.affordablemedicareinsurance.com/ . Reported by PRWeb 19 hours ago.

The good news is that the economy today is much better than it was six years ago when George W. Bush left office. The bad news is that, despite these improvements, the 40-year decline of the American middle class continues. Real unemployment is much too high, 35 million Americans continue to have no health insurance and more of our friends and neighbors are living in poverty than at almost any time in the modern history of our country.

Meanwhile, as the rich become much richer, the level of income and wealth inequality has reached obscene and unimaginable levels. In the United States, we have the most unequal level of wealth and income distribution of any major country on earth, and worse now then at any other time since the 1920s. Today, the top one-tenth of 1 percent of our nation owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent, and one family owns more wealth than the bottom 42 percent. In terms of income, 99 percent of all new income is going to the top 1 percent.

This is what a rigged economic system looks like. At a time when millions of American workers have seen declines in their incomes and are working longer hours for lower wages, the wealth of the billionaire class is soaring in a way that few can imagine. If you can believe it, between 2013 and 2015, the 14 wealthiest individuals in the country saw their net worth increase by over $157 billion dollars. Children go hungry, veterans sleep out on the streets, senior citizens cannot afford their prescription drugs -- and 14 individuals saw a $157 billion dollar increase in their wealth over a two-year period.

The grotesque level of income and wealth inequality we are experiencing is not just a moral and economic issue, it is a political issue as well. As a result of the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision, billionaires are now able to spend unlimited sums of money to buy the candidates they want. The Koch brothers, an extreme right-wing family, recently announced that they were prepared to spend some $900 million in the next election cycle. This is likely more money than either the Democratic or Republican parties will spend. If you think that it is an accident that the Republican Party has become a far-right party, think again. The Koch brothers' agenda -- ending Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the U.S. Postal Service, the Environmental Protection Agency and all campaign finance limitations -- has become the agenda of the Republican candidates they fund.

And, by the way, if you think that the Republican Party's refusal to acknowledge that climate change is real, is caused by human activity and is a severe threat to our planet, is not related to how we finance campaigns, you would be sorely mistaken. With the Koch brothers (who make much of their money in the fossil fuel industry) and big energy companies strongly supporting Republican candidates, it should not surprise anyone that my Republican colleagues reject the views of the overwhelming majority of scientists who study climate issues.

With Republicans now controlling both houses of Congress, let me briefly touch on some of the battles that I will be helping to lead in this extreme right-wing environment. In my view, with so many of our fellow citizens demoralized about the political process, it is absolutely imperative that we establish a strong progressive agenda that Americans can rally around. It must be an agenda that reflects the real needs of the working families of our country. It must be an agenda that engages people in a political struggle that they are prepared to fight for.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs: The truth is that real unemployment in our country is not the "official" and widely-reported 5.5 percent. Counting those who are under-employed and those who have given up looking for work, real unemployment is 11 percent. Even more disturbingly, youth unemployment is close to 17 percent and African-American youth unemployment is much higher than that.

If we are truly serious about reversing the decline of the middle class and putting millions of people back to work, we need a major federal jobs program. There are a number of approaches which can be taken, but the fastest way to create jobs is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure -- roads, bridges, dams, levees, airports, rail, water systems and wastewater plants.

In that regard, I have introduced legislation which would invest $1 trillion over 5 years to modernize our country's physical infrastructure. This legislation would create and maintain at least 13 million good-paying jobs. It would also make our country more productive, efficient and safe.

I will also continue my opposition to our current trade policies and vote against fast tracking the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Simply put, our trade policies have failed. Permanent normal trade relations with China have led to the loss of more than 3.2 million American jobs. The North American Free Trade Agreement has led to the loss of nearly 1 million jobs. The Korean Free Trade Agreement has led to the loss of some 60,000 jobs.

We have got to fundamentally rewrite our trade rules so that American jobs are no longer our No.1 export. Corporate America must start investing in this country, not China.

As we struggle for decent-paying jobs, we must also rebuild the trade union movement. Throughout the country, millions of workers want to join unions but are meeting fierce opposition from their employers. We need legislation that makes it easier, not harder, for unions to flourish.

Raising Wages: Today, millions of Americans are working for starvation wages. The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour is totally inadequate. In fact, the real value of today's minimum wage has declined by one-third since 1968. By raising the minimum wage to a living wage we can provide an increase in income for those people who need it the most. Our goal must be that no full-time worker in this country lives in poverty.

We must also bring about pay equity. There is no rational reason why women should be earning 78 cents on the dollar compared to men who perform the same work.

Further, we have got to expand overtime protections for millions of workers. It is absurd that "supervisors" who earn $25,000 a year are currently forced to work 50 or 60 hours a week with no overtime pay. Raising the income threshold to at least $56,680 from the absurdly low level of $23,660 a year for overtime will mean increased income for many millions of salaried workers.

Addressing Wealth and Income Inequality: Today the richest 400 Americans own more than $2.3 trillion in wealth, more than the bottom 150 million Americans combined. Meanwhile, nearly half of Americans have less than $10,000 in savings and have no idea how they will be able to retire with dignity.

We need real tax reform which makes the rich and profitable corporations begin to pay their fair share of taxes. It is absurd that in 1952 corporate income taxes provided 32 percent of federal revenue while in 2014 they provided 11 percent. It is scandalous that major profitable corporations like General Electric, Verizon, Citigroup and JP Morgan have, in a given recent year, paid nothing in federal income taxes. It is fiscally irresponsible that the U.S. Treasury loses about $100 billion a year because corporations and the rich stash their profits in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and other tax havens.

Warren Buffett is honest. He has pointed out the unfairness of him, a multi-billionaire, paying a lower effective tax rate than his secretary. It is disgraceful that millionaire hedge fund managers are able to pay lower tax effective tax rates than truck drivers or nurses because they take advantage of a variety of loopholes that their lobbyists wrote.

This must end. We need a tax system which is fair and progressive. Children should not go hungry in this country while profitable corporations and the wealthy avoid their tax responsibilities.

Reversing Climate Change: The United States must lead the world in reversing climate change and make certain that this planet is habitable for our children and grandchildren. We must transform our energy system away from fossil fuels and into energy efficiency and sustainable energies. Millions of homes and buildings need to be weatherized, our transportation system needs to be energy efficient and we need to greatly accelerate the progress we are already seeing in wind, solar, geothermal and other forms of sustainable energy. Transforming our energy system will not only protect the environment, it will create good-paying jobs.

Health Care for All: The United States remains the only major country on earth that does not guarantee health care for all as a right. Despite the modest gains of the Affordable Care Act, 35 million Americans continue to lack health insurance and many more are under-insured. Yet, we continue paying far more per capita for health care than any other nation. The United States must move toward a Medicare-for-All single-payer system.

Protecting Our Most Vulnerable: Today the United States has more people living in poverty than at almost any time in the modern history of our country. We have the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major nation, 35 million Americans still lack health insurance and millions of seniors and disabled people struggle to put food on the table because of insufficient Social Security benefits.

The Republican response to the economic pain of so many of our people was to make a bad situation much worse. The recently-passed Republican budget throws 27 million Americans off of health insurance, cuts Medicare, makes huge cuts to nutrition and makes it harder for working class families to afford college or put their kids in the Head Start program.

In my view, we have a moral responsibility to make certain that no American goes hungry or sleeps out on the streets. We must also make certain that seniors and people with disabilities can live in dignity. Not only must we vigorously oppose Republican attacks on the social safety net, we must expand benefits for those in need. That is why I have recently introduced legislation which would increase the solvency of Social Security until 2065, while expanding benefits for those who need them the most.

Making College Affordable for All: We live in a highly competitive global economy. If this country is to do well economically, we need to have the best-educated workforce in the world. Yet today many Americans cannot get a higher education, not because they are unqualified, but because they simply cannot afford it. Millions of others who do graduate from college or graduate school are drowning in debt. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the total amount of outstanding student loan debt in the United States has tripled in the last 10 years, and has now reached $1.2 trillion.

The United States must join many other countries in understanding that investing in our young people's education is investing in the future of our nation. I will soon be introducing legislation to make tuition in public colleges and universities free, as well as substantially lower interest rates on student loans.

And these are just SOME of the issues we are dealing with.

Let me conclude this letter by stating the obvious. This country is in serious trouble. Our economic system benefits the rich and large corporations and leaves working families behind. Our political system is dominated by billionaire campaign contributors and their lobbyists and is moving us in the direction of oligarchy. Our media system, owned by the corporate world, spends enormous time and energy diverting our attention away from the most important issues facing us. Climate change threatens the planet and we have a major political party denying its reality.

Clearly, the struggle to create a nation and world of economic and social justice and environmental sanity is not an easy one. But this I know: despair is not an option if we care about our kids and grandchildren. Giving up is not an option if we want to prevent irreparable harm to our planet.

We must stand up and fight back. We must launch a political revolution which engages millions of Americans from all walks of life in the struggle for real change. This country belongs to all of us, not just the billionaire class.

Please join the grass-roots revolution that we desperately need. Reported by Huffington Post 16 hours ago.

Let me get the facts straight: I didn't quit. I was fired. In fact, I was fired on New Years Eve.

It was like a rude slap in the face coupled with a "Happy New Year."

I was actually thrilled, but also scared and nervous too. I had been sick of going to that job for months, but the fear of the unknown crippled me and prevented me from quitting.

So, I tolerated the 9-to-5 grind (or 6-to-4 in my case), day in and day out until my numbers dropped below quota so they had to let me go.

For you non-sales people: I didn't make my boss enough money.

My boyfriend, Prince, had been working for himself for the past six months and was encouraging me to do the same, but I was fearful.

How would I make money? What about my stable paycheck every two weeks? What about health insurance? All these questions were constantly running through my head.

Then, the alarm would sound at 5:15am. My heart would sink and my chest would cramp. I'd slowly peel back the covers, while enviously glaring at my sleeping boyfriend, thinking about how lucky he was to work from home.

He was actually excited to get up in the morning. He actually enjoyed what he was doing.

Why does this surprise me? I'd ask myself.

Shouldn't we all be doing work that we're passionate about?

However, if you take a look at the 2013 Gallup report, my boyfriend's love for his career should come as a surprise. The harsh reality is about 70 percent of Americans hate their jobs or are completely disengaged at work.

70 percent!

Meaning: Prince is a complete outlier.

I don't know when we lost sight of choosing a meaningful and exciting career, but somehow it happened. By the time they fired me, I wanted more out of life and I knew I was ready to give entrepreneurship a try.

3 Reasons Why I Made The Switch

1) Freedom

Ahh, freedom... Even just the word freedom has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?

But, while working at my last job, I didn't truly know freedom.

I knew freedom when my manager was on paternity leave for just shy of two weeks and I wasn't being micromanaged.

I knew freedom on the one day our Internet crashed at the office so we were asked to work from home.

Three-day weekends... I knew freedom.

However, besides that, I had lost sense of what the word really meant.

Nowadays, I work from home whenever I want. I don't even have to change out of my pajamas if I don't want to.

We have the flexibility to travel, and with a stable Internet connection, work from anywhere in the world. In the past three months alone, we've worked from the beach in LA, an Airbnb tree house in Northern California, and bustling coffee shops in Denver, Washington DC, and New York... and we have plans to go abroad soon.

The world is our office; we know freedom to the core.

2) More Time Together

Prince would be eagerly awaiting my return every day at around 4pm. But I'd be exhausted logging 10 hours on someone else's punch clock. I'd give him a kiss, hit the gym if I could muster up enough energy, cook dinner and tuck myself into bed.

It sounds crazy now, but I used to give away five days of every week to work, only to receive two painfully short days during the weekend with my loved one. Consequently, this means I spent more time with my manager than I did my boyfriend.

Now, I don't know about you, but that 5:2 ratio simply wasn't satisfying.

I was sick of living for the weekend.

With entrepreneurship, I didn't have to. Mondays feel like Saturdays. And I get to spend every day with Prince.

3) Couples Who Create Together Stay Together

I believe that humans are meant to create.

However, somewhere in life, we lose our creativity and begin to consume more than we create.

If you ask a room full of kindergarteners how many of them consider themselves artists, the whole room will raise their hand. If you ask a room full of adults the same question, virtually no one raises their hand.

Why is this?

Why don't we continue to see ourselves as artists as we grow into adulthood?

When do we decide that we're nothing more than our job description - putting our daily life inside a cubicle, our ideal life into a two-week vacation, and life's other precious moments on the backburner?

If you as me, we have no use living this way.

We're meant to live and create. And having the opportunity to create with someone else is even better.

Not only do I have my boyfriend and a robust relationship, but we're also building a community of like-minded entrepreneurs. According to another Gallup study, people who have a best friend at work are seven times more likely to be engaged with their job. We're passionate about what we do because we're working for ourselves, not someone else.

We're excited by and engaged in what we do because we're invested in each other and we want to see each other succeed.

Deciding not to go back to the corporate world after I was fired wasn't easy, but it's by far the best decision I've ever made. If you're looking to live a more limitless lifestyle - one filled with freedom, friendship, and an abundance of creativity - I'd encourage you to try the entrepreneurial route too. The risk involved is easily outweighed by the rewards. Reported by Huffington Post 14 hours ago.

Filed under: Taxes

*Willowpix*

By Nancy Mann Jackson

You had every intention of filing your tax return before 11:59 P.M. on April 15, and you were chugging along nicely to meet that goal -- until you hit a roadblock. Maybe you realized you never received a crucial document in the mail, or you misplaced some receipts necessary to back up that big write-off you were counting on.

Sound familiar? You're not alone -- or doomed to miss the deadline. "Confusing tax-time problems are quite common," says Andrew Poulos, an enrolled agent and principal with Poulos Accounting & Consulting, Inc., in Atlanta. "And while they may seem daunting at first, most issues can be easily fixed-if you know what steps to take."

To help you navigate the season's trickiest head scratchers, we're laying out five common tax problems -- plus Poulos' quick tips for putting you back on track faster than you can cash your refund check.

*1. There's a Mistake on Your W-2*

If your W-2 -- the federal form issued by your employer that indicates how much you've earned and paid in taxes for the year -- reports the wrong amount of income, the Internal Revenue Service could slap you with an inflated tax bill.

As soon as you realize there's an error, immediately contact your employer and ask for a corrected form. Typically, it will do so quickly, as it's in its best interest to accurately report the full amount it has paid in taxes for each employee. "But if they don't, call the IRS. and file a complaint," Poulos says, adding that it'll then contact your employer asking for the correction on your behalf.

Unfortunately, this process can take several months, so you may need to file an extension -- but the good news is that the IRS will have records showing that you're working toward a resolution.

*2. Your Former Employer Went Out of Business*

If you haven't received a W-2 and therefore can't prove that your employer paid taxes for you because they've shuttered, it's possible that the IRS could bill you for a year's worth of back taxes -- plus interest and other penalties.

If your previous company went under before issuing you a W-2, you can file a substitute wage statement, known as the Form 4852, using information from your last pay stub to complete the document. Can't find your last paycheck? Then estimate your numbers -- but very carefully. "You'll have to substantiate your figures on Form 4852 should you ever get audited by the IRS," Poulos says. "That's why it's so important to use the most accurate figures possible."

*3. You Didn't Receive a 1099*

Unlike full-time employees with W-2s, independent contractors are typically on their own when it comes to reporting their income and paying taxes. So it's crucial to keep track of the 1099's issued by clients in order to back up your income claims.

If a company fails to send you a 1099, Poulos says it's not the end of the world. "Because there are no withholdings reflected on the 1099, your own records of income are enough to file your tax return," he explains. That said, be vigilant about keeping records of client invoices, deposit receipts and bank statements -- all of which can be used to compute your income and tax liability without a 1099.

*4. You're Missing Substantiating Documentation for a Deduction*

If you choose to itemize your deductions, you'll need receipts or other supporting documents to prove how much you spent. Otherwise, the IRS could disallow your deduction -- potentially costing you more money in taxes and penalties. "If you're just missing a few* *records or receipts, you're probably OK," Poulos says -- as long as you can come up with other ways to back up your right to a deduction.

For instance, if you want to deduct business travel, but failed to keep a detailed log of how many miles you drove to visit clients, Poulos suggests trying to re-create an accurate account using gas station receipts.

If you know how many miles you get to the gallon, then you can tally up how far you drove based on the number of times you filled up at the pump. Just be sure to deduct your personal use from the total mileage. For other types of business deductions -- like hotel stays or client meals -- where you don't have actual purchase receipts, a credit card or bank statement may do the trick.

*5. You're Confused How to Prove You Had Health Insurance*

For the first time in 2014, all taxpayers must prove they have health insurance to avoid paying federal penalties. If you bought a policy on the exchange, you'll receive Form 1095-A as supporting documentation. But if you have private insurance -- both taken out for yourself or provided through an employer -- it's a little trickier.

"The IRS has not given us specific instructions about what types of documentation to provide to show health insurance coverage," Poulos says. "And that can be confusing." For now, Poulos says he's advising clients to offer up as much information as possible. That could include copies of your insurance card, billing statements from your insurance provider, or your final pay stub, showing how much was deducted from your paycheck for premiums.

 

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments Reported by DailyFinance 23 hours ago.

The health care plan was killed, revived last week, and killed again.... Reported by Raw Story 22 hours ago.

Health insurance companies are spending billions of dollars to make sure the doctors and other medical-care providers they work with have the tools they need to move from fee-for-service medicine to value-based care and population health. Reported by Motley Fool 18 hours ago.

The American Lung Association says Indiana's health insurance marketplace is failing to provide all the coverage it should to help people quit smoking under President Barack Obama's health care law. Reported by WTHR 13 hours ago.

Hispanic advocates say at least 200,000 Latinos could get health insurance if Florida lawmakers choose to expand Medicaid. Reported by WEAR ABC 3 2 hours ago.

As the April 15 tax deadline nears, people who got help paying for health insurance under President Barack Obama's law are seeing the direct effect on their refunds — hundreds of dollars, for better or worse. Reported by cbs4.com 21 hours ago.

Hispanic advocates say at least 200,000 Latinos could get health insurance if Florida lawmakers choose to expand Medicaid. Reported by cbs4.com 20 hours ago.

As the April 15 tax deadline nears, people who got help paying for health insurance under President Barack Obama's law are seeing the direct effect on their refunds - hundreds of dollars, for better or worse. Reported by WTHR 19 hours ago.

Most of New York's health insurance exchange plans now cover only one external prosthetic device per limb per lifetime for adult amputees, making its coverage among the most restrictive in the country. Reported by Newsday 19 hours ago.

As the April 15 tax deadline nears, people who got help paying for health insurance under President Barack Obama's law are seeing the direct effect on their refunds - hundreds of dollars, for better or worse. Reported by Newsmax 17 hours ago.

Mother and 10-Year-Old Son Face Deportation Over Autism Diagnosis
Mother and 10-Year-Old Son Face Deportation Over Autism Diagnosis
Headlines
Health
autism, maria sevilla, tyrone, deportation, australia, work visa
Has Been Optimized

The Australian federal government ruled in favor of deporting a woman and her 10-year-old son to their native Philippines because they fear that the boy, who has autism, could end up being a tax burden.

Maria Sevilla, a nurse in Queensland, has lived in Australia with her son Tyrone for eight years. In 2014, the Australian government rejected Sevilla’s request for a work visa. She appealed the decision, and that appeal was rejected earlier this week.

“"I hope I’m not considered as a burden. I’m trying my best to work for Tyrone’s future,” Sevilla said. The mother and her son could be deported in as soon as 28 days. “It’s like, I’m pleading for our life, for Tyrone’s future,” she said.

Sevilla created a Change.org petition late last year, which has garnered support from nearly 64,000 people. “In 2007, I brought Tyrone to Australia with me. He was 2 and a half. 6 months after we arrived he was diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder,” Sevilla wrote on the page. “Tyrone is not a burden, he is a joy. He’s non-verbal, but he still hears and still experiences the world. He is a happy child with full of life attitude and can lighten the mood of a room with his presence. He doesn’t take any medication, and he attends a special school. The idea that he can’t contribute because of his condition is just wrong. People with autism can be excellent at a whole range of things, he just need to be given a chance!”

On Thursday, the Queensland Nurses Union issued a statement expressing their support for Sevilla and Tyrone and urging immigration minister Peter Dutton to reverse the decision.

“The Queensland Nurses’ Union calls on Minister Dutton to protect 10-year-old Tyrone instead of punishing him for his condition,” the statement read. “Tyrone’s mother Maria is a hard-working and highly valued rehabilitation nurse who helps patients who have lost limbs and suffered spinal and brain injuries to rebuild their lives. Ms. Sevilla pays taxes, has private health insurance, and plays an integral role in supporting and bettering the community in which she lives. No child deserves to be sent into the vast unknown as punishment for a manageable medical condition for which they are not responsible.”

Sources: Yahoo Parenting, ABC.net, Change.org / Photo Credit: yahoo.com

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This article appears in the Spring 2015 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here.

In 1999, while he was working at a local immigrant service center in Los Angeles, Victor Narro began encountering a particularly aggrieved group of workers. They were the men who worked at carwashes, and their complaint was that they were paid solely in tips—the carwashes themselves paid them nothing at all.

At first, the workers came by in a trickle, but soon enough, in a flood. Narro, whose soft voice and shy manner belie a keen strategic sensibility, consulted with legal services attorneys and discovered that while every now and then a carwash was penalized for cheating its workers, such instances were few and far between. “There were no regulations overseeing the industry,” Narro says. The state’s labor department conducted no sweeps of the carwashes to investigate what looked to be an industry-wide pattern of violations of basic wage and hour laws. When Narro took a new job at UCLA’s Labor Center, he had researchers survey L.A. carwashes. They reported that roughly one-fourth of the industry’s 10,000 workers were paid only in tips.

The workers who did get a paycheck weren’t raking it in, either. Wage theft was the norm in the industry, and the carwasheros (as the workers, almost entirely Mexican and Central American immigrants, have come to be called) had little recourse—especially since so many were undocumented. Oscar Sanchez, a tall, sober-faced carwashero who came to Los Angeles from Guatemala in 2000, recalls working a 10-hour day and routinely getting paid for five hours. Workers at his carwash, in South Central L.A., got no lunch breaks; the owner would “bring us burgers and we’d have to wash cars and eat at the same time.” The owner also had a mini-mart on the property, and rented the two rooms upstairs as living quarters for four of the workers—one of them Sanchez. “She wouldn’t pay us on time, but she demanded the rent on time,” Sanchez says. “When we fell behind, she said she couldn’t pay us because we owed her rent.”

Under California law, employers in a few industries in which wage theft was endemic—farm labor contracting, garment work, and construction—were required to register with the state and post surety bonds every year to cover any back-pay settlements and penalties that authorities assessed on them. Armed with data from his researchers, Narro asked legislators to get carwash owners added to the list. The bill, signed into law by Governor Gray Davis, required owners to register with the state and to post a $15,000 bond to cover labor-code violations.

But the new law changed nothing. Davis’s successor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, had no interest in strengthening it when it came up for renewal at two-year intervals. “We’d win cases, but we were still swamped with violations,” says Narro.

In 2006, the national AFL-CIO had established a partnership with a union of day laborers, and Narro reasoned that the Federation might be interested in trying to foster a union of carwasheros, too. He approached the AFL-CIO, which responded enthusiastically and sought out an established union willing to undertake the campaign. The United Steelworkers—which had expanded into other sectors as the U.S. steelmaking industry continued to shrink—took up the cause. Steelworkers Local 675, an L.A.-based union that chiefly represented oil refinery workers, agreed to undertake the campaign and welcome the carwasheros into the local. “If you can’t make steel,” says Dave Campbell, the local’s secretary-treasurer, “you might as well wash it.”

In 2008, the AFL-CIO and the Steelworkers commenced their campaign. The Federation staffed the carwasheros’ worker center, named CLEAN, with organizers under the direction of Justin McBride, a veteran of multiple union campaigns. The Steelworkers loaned organizers to the effort and announced it would negotiate contracts and service the new members.

By 2013, however, the campaign had stalled. Of the estimated 500 carwashes in Los Angeles County, just four had gone union. Part of the problem was that the industry itself was fragmented. CLEAN’s research determined that the 500 carwashes had 450 different owners; no one owned more than five. Worse still, a number of carwashes seemed to be operating like Walter White’s carwash in Breaking Bad—less as a business than as a money-laundering operation. Finally, no individual carwash employed more than a handful of workers, which made organizing both costly and labor-intensive.

To succeed, a completely new strategy was needed. In 2013, with the carwash law set for renewal, McBride proposed to greatly increase the bond carwash owners had to post—unless they established a formal grievance procedure, the kind that, by law, can only exist under a union contract.

Schwarzenegger had by then returned to Hollywood, and his successor, Jerry Brown, had long supported the cause of low-wage workers. Brown’s labor commissioner, Julie Su, had begun sweeps of carwashes that routinely turned up violations. Democrats, following the 2012 elections, had two-thirds majorities in both houses of the legislature. The stars were aligned for McBride’s proposal, though he had “to compile data showing that the $15,000 bond was inadequate” to protect workers, says Caitlin Vega, the state AFL-CIO’s lobbyist who was shepherding the bill that codified McBride’s proposal. Fortunately, she adds, “Justin is very good at math.”

In a rather elegant solution, the bill that passed the legislature and that Brown signed simply added a zero to the $15,000. (It also eliminated the original act’s two-year sunset provision.) Starting in January 2014, carwash owners would have to post a bond of $150,000—unless they agreed to let their workers go union.

As the new year dawned, Labor Commissioner Su and Los Angeles City Attorney Michael Feuer convened a raucous meeting of more than 100 L.A. carwash owners to explain the new statute. “We heard some complaints about the law,” Su says, but the purpose of the meeting was to make clear both the terms of the law and Su and Feuer’s intention to enforce it with ongoing and widespread inspections.

Several months later, 16 carwashes announced they were going union. Today, Local 675 represents workers at 25 carwashes in Southern California. The unionized carwasheros work under contracts that their union representative, Manuel Ramirez, acknowledges are “very basic.” They make roughly 2 percent above minimum wage, they have shaded places where they take their breaks, they have lunch breaks, fresh water, time clocks, regular paychecks— the merest basics of a work relationship, but ones routinely denied their nonunion brethren. The unionized carwashes are chiefly those that couldn’t afford the new surety bond, located disproportionately in the poorer sections of the city. Still, both the new law and the increased inspection regimen have improved conditions across the industry. “Now,” says Narro, “hardly any carwasheros are paid only in tips.”

 

Photo courtesy of USW Local 675

Though the longest of long shots, the carwashero campaign has unionized two dozen Los Angeles–area carwashes—with the crucial assistance of state government.

*THE VICTORIES OF THE CARWASHEROS*, limited though they be, are a clear example of what Rutgers University sociology professor Janice Fine terms “regulatory unionism”—the enactment or enforcement of laws that not only better workers’ lot but also enhance their ability to organize in their workplace. The latter, of course, was the intent of the National Labor Relations Act, the federal law passed in 1935 that created a clear process through which workers could form unions. Over the past four decades, however, the NLRA has largely become a dead letter, as employers have found multiple ways to violate the terms of the act with impunity.  

Though Obama labor officials have improved enforcement efforts, conservative pressure at the federal level has thwarted all efforts to strengthen the NLRA itself. But with the heightened profile of the economic-inequality issue, the burgeoning of low-paying jobs, and the demonstrations of low-wage workers for higher wages and greater justice, state and city governments have proved more responsive to the new proletariat’s plight. With the lion’s share of major American cities now firmly in liberal control (25 of the nation’s 30 largest cities currently have Democratic mayors), municipalities have raised the local minimum wage and required employers to provide their workers with paid sick days and, for part-time retail workers, an advance schedule of their hours. Only seven states, however, have Democratic governors and Democratic control of both houses of the legislature, so the number of such pro-worker statutes emerging from statehouses is smaller.

But the one thing that progressive states and cities have generally not been able to do is enact measures that help workers organize into unions. The NLRA specifically preempts most such endeavors. That’s why the case of the carwasheros is so remarkable.  

Nonetheless, the carwasheros’ victory illustrates one of the three ways in which cities and states can currently boost not just worker income but worker power. These paths, to be sure, are narrow—but not so narrow that they can’t accommodate more campaigns from creative strategists and dedicated workers. The three paths are:

· Using a city or state’s purchasing, financial, regulatory, or wage-setting power to foster worker organization;
· Giving worker organizations the authority to help enforce and monitor city or state labor ordinances; and
· Cracking down on the misclassification of workers so that those mislabeled as “independent contractors” can become unionizable employees.

 

*THE FIRST STRATEGY, PIONEERED* by the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) and copied in multiple cities, is to condition city approval of new projects seeking tax abatements, public funds, or other municipal assistance on those projects meeting labor criteria that benefit the city’s residents: the payment of living wages, the hiring of women and minorities, the adherence to environmental standards—and the ability of workers in the project to join unions.

No one has done more to foster unionization through such policies than Madeline Janis, LAANE ’s founding director and now the head of Jobs to Move America, which seeks to bring the manufacture of rail cars and buses—an industry almost entirely offshored in recent decades—back to the United States and back to unionized American workers. In 2008, Los Angeles voters levied a tax increase on themselves to fund the construction of an ambitious rail system. When L.A.’s transit authority began looking for a rail-car manufacturer, however, virtually all were overseas. Even more problematically, the federal Department of Transportation conditioned its considerable financial support for such transit projects on conventional lowest-bidder criteria. Janis managed to persuade the department to add a “best value” criterion that gives points to bidders who hire veterans and workers from neighborhoods with high poverty rates. Able to choose a bidder by those criteria, the L.A. agency selected a Japanese manufacturer that pledged to build a factory in L.A. County and, with further prodding from Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, not to oppose its workers’ efforts to unionize. Transit agencies in Chicago and Maryland have now adopted contract criteria similar to those in Los Angeles.

LAANE and its many offshoots have most often been founded and, initially, funded by their cities’ hotel unions—locals of UNITE HERE. Beginning in the 1990s, that union succeeded in conditioning many city governments’ approval of new hotel projects that sought some form of financial assistance on the hotels agreeing to let their workers choose whether to join a union. A new wrinkle in this strategy appeared in 2005, when the East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy (EBASE) won the approval of voters in Emeryville—a small city wedged between Berkeley and Oakland—to require a minimum wage, higher than California’s, for employees of that city’s hotels, on the theory that the local taxpayers’ support for public infrastructure around the Bay Bridge was really the key to the hotels’ success and, indeed, existence. LAANE followed up in 2007 by persuading the Los Angeles City Council to enact a similar ordinance for the hotels lining Century Boulevard, the approach road to LAX, and again last year, when it convinced the city council to set an hourly wage of $15.37 for workers at every hotel in the city with at least 150 rooms.

Each of these statutes contained one crucial “supercession” (or escape hatch for employers): They allowed hotels that reached collective-bargaining agreements with their workers to waive the wage requirement if their employees, through their contracts, agreed to it in return for other benefits. With this option clearly serving as an incentive to unionization, UNITE HERE was able to organize the large hotels of Emeryville and five of the 12 hotels on L.A.’s Century Boulevard. The citywide Los Angeles ordinance, which covers 63 hotels, many of them already unionized, takes effect later this year.

Such “carve-outs,” as they are also called, not only can pressure owners and managers but also give workers some choices in the bargaining process. “Collective bargaining supercession cuts both ways,” says Ken Jacobs, who chairs the Center for Labor Research and Education at the University of California, Berkeley. The waitstaff in some Bay Area hotels, he says, made enough in tips to trade away a higher legislated wage in return for better benefits. When unions are strong, supercession can work to employees’ advantage; when unions are weak, it may not.

When San Francisco enacted the nation’s first Retail Workers Bill of Rights late last year, requiring managers to provide their employees with their work schedules two weeks in advance, the city’s leading unions of retail workers, for instance, chose not to lobby for an exemption for retail establishments that had union contracts. For one thing, the vast majority of the city’s retail outlets had no such contracts and the union, even with a carveout, believed it lacked the capacity to organize them. For another, a number of the union’s existing contracts contained no such provision for advance scheduling; many of its own members would plainly benefit from a straight-up application of the law. The bill was enacted with no supercessions. “If your union doesn’t have much leverage,” says one labor lawyer, “you usually want just a law that sets a standard.”

Jacobs argues that even without carve-outs, such laws still advantage unions. “From an organizing perspective, setting a $15.37 wage for all large hotels reduces the differential between union and nonunion hotels, which has grown very large as the cost of health benefits has gone up. You have to raise wages across the board to narrow the difference in labor costs between union and nonunion establishments. Legislating labor standards can be a way to reduce one of the barriers to unionization.”

 

*THE SECOND FORM OF CITY* or state policy that enhances worker power is giving worker organizations the authority and funding to monitor and educate workers about the labor-standard laws that those governments enact. In 2007, San Francisco passed an ordinance requiring employers to provide their employees with health insurance and paid sick days. Last year, the council established advance scheduling for retail workers, and city voters enacted a $15 minimum wage. The city’s office of labor standards enforcement, says Donna Levitt, its manager, has recognized that “workers feel more comfortable going to a community group than a government agency” when they experience mistreatment on the job, and has contracted with and funded a range of community-based organizations, most of them rooted in particular minority communities, to augment the office’s own outreach and monitoring efforts.

The most notable success these efforts have achieved came at Yank Sing in Chinatown—the James Beard Award–winning establishment considered one of the nation’s foremost (and highest-dollar) dim-sum restaurants. In 2013, some Yank Sing workers, who were protesting pervasive wage and hour violations, approached the Chinese Progressive Association (CPA), one of the groups with which the city had contracted to monitor labor standards. Interviewing workers in their homes, CPA identified a number of worker-leaders who persuaded nearly 100 of the restaurant’s 280 employees (virtually all of them Chinese immigrants) to file legal claims for back pay and to pressure management to end other abusive labor practices. The workers established a committee to negotiate with the owners, and the following autumn, in a process overseen by Levitt’s office, won a settlement awarding them more than $4 million in back pay and providing them health insurance (as required by city law) and vacations. Though they were already functioning in the manner of a union, the workers chose not to form one.

In fact, while there are a number of worker centers that organize workers to help monitor ordinances, and even collect dues from some of their members, few if any have been able to take the crucial step of helping workers form unions. The problem is that once workers’ organizations elect representatives to bargain over pay and working conditions with private-sector employers, they fall under the not-very-protective jurisdiction of the NLRA—and thus become easy prey for employers seeking to retain nonunion status.

What’s the most, then, that worker organizations helping enforce labor standards can do? One labor leader, speaking on background, criticizes the San Francisco model of funding multiple worker centers for fragmenting the already attenuated power that such organizations wield. If the city funded just one omnibus group that also received dues payments from members, he argues, that group might amass enough resources to become a force in city politics—still not a union, but something more than a monitor, and a more forceful advocate for workers’ interests.

 

(AP Photo/Nick Ut, File)

Five days of striking by truck drivers shut the massive ports in Long Beach, California, in 2014. A federal court later ruled that Green Fleet drivers weren’t independent contractors but actually employees.

*THE THIRD WAY THAT CITIES* and states can build worker power is to stop the illegal practice of worker misclassification. Over the past several decades, many U.S. companies have relieved themselves of the obligation to provide their workers with benefits or pay them an adequate wage, through the expedient of declaring their workers not to be their employees. One common practice is to contract with employment agencies that claim the workers are formally theirs, even though the workers may labor for years at the same company. (Such practices are the norm at the massive warehouses of retailers such as Walmart, and at the factories of Japanese auto manufacturers in Southern states.) Another dodge, prevalent in trucking, is to claim drivers are independent contractors even though they work for just one company, a notable example being the case of the port truckers who move containers from the nation’s harbors to retailers’ warehouses.

Byron Monzon, who has worked as a port trucker for the past 13 years, has actually had weeks where he drove full time and ended up owing the company. As Monzon explains, the company routinely deducts from his paycheck all the expenses for which he, as an “independent contractor,” is held responsible: gas, maintenance, tires, insurance. Despite this, the port truckers’ loads, routes, and hours are set by their trucking company, and they are expressly forbidden to use their truck for any other company, or purpose.

Since the 1980s, a range of unions have sought ways to have those mislabeled truckers (estimated at 50,000 nationally) legally redefined as employees. Nearly a decade ago, the Teamsters, LAANE, and a number of environmental and community groups initiated a joint campaign at the adjoining ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, where 40 percent of the nation’s imports arrive, mainly from Asia. While the groups won stricter emissions standards for trucks, it wasn’t until two years ago that their efforts to reclassify and organize truckers began to show some movement.

What made the difference—just as with the carwasheros— was in large part a supportive state labor commissioner. For years, individual workers had gone to court alleging wage theft—fruitlessly, since their status as independent contractors meant they weren’t protected by wage and hour legislation. But with the election of Brown as governor and the appointment of Su as his labor commissioner, the state’s labor department began to rule that the truckers fit the legal description of employees. At that point, says Roxana Tynan, Janis’s successor as LAANE’s executive director, the Teamster-LAANE strategy shifted to “focusing on ever larger numbers of wage and hour violations, building up a big penalty for the trucking companies.”

The penalties indeed grew bigger. This year, a court upheld a state labor department ruling that seven drivers for Pacer Cartage were actually employees, and ordered that they receive $2 million in back pay and penalties. A 2014 report by LAANE and two other groups estimated that the total amount of back pay—excluding penalties— that California trucking companies owed the port drivers was roughly $850 million.

Emboldened by the settlements, more and more port drivers have filed misclassification actions with the state labor commission; to date, they’ve won every one. Since the cascade of rulings has not in itself been sufficient to build unions, however, the Teamsters have also called a series of one- and two-day strikes against targeted trucking companies—a considerable risk for the drivers, since there’s no law against firing an “independent contractor” for striking.

The strikes have proved a stunning success. By picketing the companies’ trucks at the port terminal gates where trucks line up, the striking drivers were able to stop the flow of trucks into the terminal yards—compelling the terminals to announce they’d no longer do business with those companies. And in a groundbreaking decision, a federal appellate court ordered one company, Green Fleet, to rehire two “independent contractors” it had discharged for striking, on the grounds that the drivers were really employees and thus protected by labor law.

Confronted with mounting financial penalties, unfavorable legal rulings, and business shutdowns, some companies have begun to acknowledge that they are actually employers. Last September, Shippers Transport Express, one of the largest companies that drivers had sued, told its drivers it would acknowledge their status as employees, and this February, it signed a contract that entitled them to a $21 hourly wage, paid sick days, and employer-provided medical, vision, and dental care. The Teamsters are currently in negotiations with other companies that would still have to make good on drivers’ back-pay claims, but could waive the additional penalties if the drivers agreed—provided the truckers were deemed employees and could vote on whether to join a union. A bill currently pending in the California legislature would exempt companies from such penalties if they made good on the worker’s claims and reclassified them as what they are—employees.

 

*ALL THREE OF THESE PATHS* to worker power require clear-eyed strategies, a core of crack organizers, and workers willing to take some considerable risks—the more so since all these endeavors involve workers who are largely immigrants, many undocumented. But they also require the political support of state or local governments. In that sense, they conform to what former organizer Rich Yeselson terms a strategy of “fortress unionism”—of continuing to keep unions strong in those locales where they already have some support, in the bluest cities and states.

But nothing about these endeavors resembles a “hold the fort” strategy. On the contrary, they rely on organizing the immigrant populations that have transformed American cities, in coalitions with other progressive groups, to elect local and state governments concerned with the plight of low-wage workers. They necessitate the painstaking worksite, home-visit, and community organizing always required to build unions, this time in industries where state or local government may have just enough authority to empower workers, the deficiencies of the NLRA notwithstanding.

Absent changes in the NLRA, absent a sea change in the nation’s balance of political power, these will remain niche campaigns—but niche campaigns may be the best labor can do just now. They offer a hopeful new model in a larger labor environment that often feels hopeless. “The movement is changing,” says California AFL-CIO lobbyist Vega. “Increasingly, we’re focused on the fight of low-wage workers for basic justice—super-exploited workers who in the face of every kind of abuse and intimidation are brave enough to fight back. For people in today’s union movement, that’s what inspires us.” Reported by The American Prospect 15 minutes ago.

How to Tell Employees That Your Health Insurance Plan Is Changing Reported by ajc.com 21 hours ago.

Filed under: Taxes, Personal Finance, Health Insurance, Tax Laws, Tax Refunds

*Steve Nesius/AP*William Preus was covered by Obamacare for part of last year before transitioning to Medicare, creating a major tax headache for him.

By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR

WASHINGTON -- As the April 15 tax deadline nears, people who got help paying for health insurance under President Barack Obama's law are seeing the direct effect on their refunds -- hundreds of dollars, for better or worse.

The law offers tax credits so people without access to job-based health insurance can buy private coverage. Because these subsidies are tied to income, consumers must accurately estimate what they will make for the coming year.

That's been a challenge for millions of people.
"I was expecting to get dinged a little bit, but I was actually kind of surprised when it came down that much.

Guess on the low side, get more help now with premiums, but owe money later at filing time. Overestimate income, expect bucks back from the taxman.

Many consumers may not have understood that is how it works when they signed up. Some experts caution that such complications could discourage uninsured people from getting covered.

Rob Tuck of Dublin, California, said he had anticipated a refund of about $400 on his 2014 taxes. But that almost has been wiped out because he had to repay some of the subsidy. He changed jobs during the year, and his income went up a little.

Tuck, who works for a San Francisco area tech-support company, said he enrolled to avoid tax penalties for being uninsured, but feels penalized anyway now.

"I was expecting to get dinged a little bit, but I was actually kind of surprised when it came down that much," he said.

*'Hard to Estimate'*

Kelsey Park started out 2014 in Dallas, earning good commissions by selling wedding gowns. She left for graduate school at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, and signed up for coverage through the law. She ended up overestimating her income because she didn't get another job as anticipated.Park's tax refund came to $2,500, partly because she had too much income tax withheld and partly because she received a smaller health care subsidy than she was entitled to.

"It was hard to estimate what I would be earning because I was transitioning in life," said Park, who's studying for a master's degree in marketing. "I tend to overestimate because I don't want to have to pay back," she said.

The average refund is large enough to offset any repayment in most cases, according to the Treasury Department. The White House says the Affordable Care Act is working even better than anticipated.

But this is the first year that the complicated connections between the law and the tax system are playing out for consumers.

Initial reports suggest a fairly even split between tax-return winners and losers.

Earlier in the filing season, tax preparation company H&R Block (HRB) reported that 52 percent of its customers who got health insurance subsidies owed money back. Repayments averaged $530, reducing expected refunds by 17 percent.

On the other hand, roughly one-third of customers with subsidies overestimated their incomes. As a result, their refunds went up by $365 on average.

*Bigger Refunds?*

In a recent study, the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation estimated that half those eligible for a subsidy would owe money, while 45 percent would receive a bigger refund.

The estimated average repayment was $794, and the refund was $773. The estimates were based on an analysis of census data about income changes among people likely eligible for health care subsidies.

Kaiser calculated that overall between 4.5 million and 7.5 million households have to account to the IRS for their subsidies.

This year is "a learning experience" for consumers and the government alike, said Kaiser's Cynthia Cox. "To the extent this makes people unsure of how much financial help they are going to get, it could be a discouragement for some to sign up."

To avoid tax surprises, consumers should contact the health insurance exchange if their income changes during the year.

Tucker Bush, an AmeriCorps VISTA volunteer in Tacoma, Washington, basically broke even. He ended up giving back $19 of his subsidy, but not before he had spent an hour trying to figure out IRS Form 8962, which taxpayers must use to account for their subsidies.

*'Bit of a Headache'*

"It caused me a little bit of a headache, and I have a college degree," said Bush, who volunteers at a nonprofit dental clinic for children. "If you are trying to help someone who may not have a college diploma, this is going to be a nightmare."

Bill Preus of St. Petersburg, Florida, was covered under the health care law for three months last year before transitioning to Medicare because of disability. Preus once had his own insurance agency, selling life and health policies. He is used to complexity, but said he never has seen anything like this.

Preus said he faces the prospect of paying back close to $4,000 because of poor coordination between HealthCare.gov and his insurer, the government's failure to discontinue his health law subsidy after he went on Medicare, and forgiveness of a student loan debt that caused his income to go up.

"There is no one to talk to who can coordinate when extenuating circumstances like this come up, and it's a total mess," he said.

Preus said a tax preparer and an IRS representative both advised him to file an incomplete return so as to trigger an audit, suggesting that may be the best way to straighten things out.

-Associated Press Social Media Editor Eric Carvin contributed to this report.

 

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments Reported by DailyFinance 21 hours ago.

Tax exemptions of profit-making health care businesses, long controversial in an industry that is taking hold of a greater share of the U.S. economy, are coming under fire once again. This time, it’s nonprofit health insurance companies like Blue Shield of California, which recently lost its state income tax exemption after [...] Reported by Forbes.com 21 hours ago.

WASHINGTON -- Four years ago, Alabama’s new Republican governor, along with the state's first majority-GOP legislature since Reconstruction, faced a tough, high-stakes decision: Make the best of a federal health care reform law they hated, or stiff-arm President Barack Obama.

Even in this conservative Southern state, it wasn’t an easy call. Gov. Robert Bentley (R) had campaigned on a platform that supported creating a health insurance exchange, a pillar of the Affordable Care Act, which he otherwise opposed. Five months after taking office, Bentley impaneled a commission to advise him whether Alabama should establish a state-run exchange or let the federal government create one for them. The key state legislators got to work.

The Bentley administration, the Alabama legislature and the governor’s Alabama Health Insurance Exchange Study Commission weighed many of the same issues their counterparts in other states did. How would they finance the exchange's operations? Should a state agency or some other entity manage a new marketplace? How heavily should insurance companies be regulated? Would it better for Alabama to exert at least a little control over Obamacare, or to just let the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services do the work?

One thing they didn’t seem to consider was whether Alabamians would be able to receive subsidies to make their health insurance more affordable if the state defaulted to a federally operated exchange, according to documents and interviews with principal figures in the debate.

The absence of consideration of that critical provision is remarkable in light of judicial and political developments over the past year. In June, the Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling on King v. Burwell, a lawsuit alleging that these tax credits should only be available in state-run exchanges.

The consequences for those in Alabama and 33 other states who get health insurance from federally operated exchanges could be dire. More than 220,000 Alabamians are enrolled in plans obtained on the federal exchange, and more than 165,000 of them receive subsidies that could be eliminated by the high court, according to federal data compiled by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

The plaintiffs in King v. Burwell, and their allies, want the Supreme Court and the American public to believe not only that the precise wording of the Affordable Care Act -- the phrase “established by the State” -- makes these subsidies permissible only in state-run exchanges, but that this was the clear intent of Congress and was fully understood by state officials when they were deciding which path to choose.

“Any English speaker would immediately understand that no subsidies are available for coverage obtained on an exchange established by HHS,” reads the brief filed by the plaintiffs to the Supreme Court.

And here’s what it says in an amicus brief signed by Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange (R) and his counterparts in five other states in support of the lawsuit: “In making their exchange-establishing decisions, the states were well aware that the plain text of Section 36B conditioned the availability of tax credits on states establishing exchanges.”

If that was the case four years ago, no one told Alabama state Sen. Jim McClendon (R), a native English speaker who co-chaired Bentley’s commission while a member of the state House of Representatives, which unanimously passed a bill in April 2012 to establish an Alabama health insurance exchange.

“No. No. No. That was never, never brought up,” McClendon said in an interview with The Huffington Post last month. “I was unaware of that stipulation in the Affordable Care Act, and I would almost have to guess that anybody involved in this process was not aware of it. I was a little surprised when it came up eventually. Nope. I was the chairman of the commission and I was totally unaware of that.”

In other words, according to McClendon, at no point during the commission’s five meetings between September and November 2011, nor during a legislative debate that stretched into the spring of 2012, did anyone conceive of the most significant consequence that could result from Alabama opting for a federally run health insurance marketplace. The commission ended up unanimously recommending a state-run exchange.

Three other people who served on the 15-member Alabama Health Insurance Exchange Study Commission, as well as Robert Carey, a Boston-based consultant hired by the state Department of Insurance to advise the panel, also said the tax credits issue never came up during the commission’s work.

“Never. It was never discussed,” said Carey, who worked with other states including Delaware and West Virginia on their exchanges options at the time, when he was employed by LMI, a Tysons, Virginia-based government contractor. “It was never a consideration that they weren’t going to get subsidies if they deferred to the feds. I mean, I was there at every commission meeting and I was presenting, ‘Here are your options, here’s what I think it might cost you,’ and we did those type of calculations."

“It is mind-boggling to me how everyone has now kind of glommed on to this. ‘Oh, yeah. This was totally discussed, and we knew subsidies wouldn’t be available if we went to the federal exchange.’ It’s just hogwash,” Carey said.
Jim McClendon (left), then a member of the Alabama House of Representatives and now a state senator, with Gov. Robert Bentley (seated) in 2012.

HuffPost also interviewed Richard Brockman, an attorney at Burr & Forman in Birmingham who represented the Alabama Nursing Home Association on the commission; Rosemary Elebash, state director of the National Federation of Independent Business in Montgomery, who was appointed to the panel by Alabama Senate President pro tempore Del Marsh (R); and Ron Perkins, vice president of Birmingham-based Doozer Software, who was appointed to the commission by Alabama House Speaker Mike Hubbard (R).

Here’s how they responded to the question of whether they discussed the possibility that tax credits wouldn’t be available if Alabama opted for a federal exchange.

Brockman:No, no, no. I mean, no, no, no. I mean, the notion of finding a needle in the haystack hadn’t occurred to anybody at the time... No, no, no. It never came up, and that is something I would absolutely have remembered.
Elebash:That was never a discussion. Nobody even knew that... I don’t remember any discussion about that. The only thing that I can remember is, you either establish a state exchange or the feds are going to do it for you. I mean, that was essentially the discussion.
Perkins:I don’t remember that coming up. I really don’t. I really don’t ever remember that ever being brought up as an issue... I don’t ever remember anybody saying, ‘Well, if we do this and let the feds do it, this is the trade-off down the road'... I’m almost positive somebody would’ve brought it up... During the time, we didn’t know that. After the commission, that’s when all that stuff started coming out. We were like, ‘Oh, wait a minute.’ That could’ve really changed, obviously, the advice to the governor, because I don’t think he would’ve even said we’re not going to do it if it was clear at that point in time, all the way back four, five years ago, that if you don’t do this, here’s the side effect. Because that’s a huge trade-off.
The remaining commissioners either declined to speak to HuffPost, didn’t respond to phone calls or emails, or couldn’t be reached. These parties include Alabama Insurance Commissioner Jim Ridling and state Sen. Greg Reed (R), the co-chairman of the commission and then-chairman of the Alabama Senate Health Committee.
Rosemary Elebash (right) with Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley and first lady Dianne Bentley in 2012.

In addition, HuffPost reviewed hundreds of pages of documents that LMI and Mathematica Policy Research presented to the commission and prepared for a separate series of stakeholder meetings organized by the Alabama Department of Insurance in May and June 2011. None of these documents advised of the possibility that subsidies would be contingent on the type of exchange. Local news stories about the exchange process in 2011 and 2012 that HuffPost reviewed also don’t mention the issue.

This evidence, or lack thereof, reveals a major problem with the claims underlying the Obamacare lawsuit, and is consistent with the assertions of Democratic members of Congress and their aides, along with those of Obama administration officials. These findings also mirror those from a previous HuffPost investigation of documents from numerous other states.

HuffPost did speak to two individuals from Alabama who made contrary, but dubious, claims that the legislature and the commission did, in fact, consider the subsidies question during the time before Bentley rejected a state-run exchange in December 2012.

One was then-Rep. Greg Wren, the lead Republican advocate for an Alabama exchange in the state House, who resigned after pleading guilty to corruption charges last year and currently operates a lobbying and public relations firm in Montgomery. The other was Thomas Younger, now a senior vice president at J. Smith Lanier & Co. in Huntsville, whom Marsh, the state Senate leader, appointed to the commission to represent Alabama’s insurance agents.

Wren and Younger insisted that the subsidies issue now at the heart of the Supreme Court case was part of their calculations at the time, and that it was widely discussed by policymakers including commissioners and lawmakers.

“I’ve got it in my notes,” said Younger, who also said Carey advised the commission about the matter, contrary to Carey’s own account. “Very clearly, it was brought up and discussed."

Younger also stated, incorrectly, that these subsidies would only be available for the first two years that any health insurance exchange existed. The Affordable Care Act does not include an ending date for these subsidies. Younger didn't respond to follow-up requests to provide his documentation, nor did he provide an explanation for why his account conflicts with those of McClendon and others.

Wren was the author of the health insurance exchange bill the state House passed in April 2012, and he championed a state-run marketplace until Bentley’s final decision in December of that year to forgo a state exchange. Wren told HuffPost he still believes Alabama should have its own exchange.

Wren claimed in an interview that he was aware, early on, of a provision in the law that would restrict subsidies to those who purchased coverage on state exchanges. But in a subsequent email, his account shifted. Wren first said that issue came to his attention in 2009, before Obamacare had even passed. In a subsequent email, he wrote that he had misspoken during the interview, and said he'd actually learned of this phrase in 2011.

“I believed at the time that for many reasons, including the possible favorable premium treatment to individuals purchasing from a state exchange, that Alabama should consider this over a federal,” he wrote.
Greg Wren, then a member of the Alabama House of Representatives, in 2011.

There is little evidence to back Wren's claim that he was aware of the now-controversial provision in Obamacare during his state’s debate over whether to establish an exchange. The former legislator could not offer an explanation for why his version of events differs from those of McClendon and the others interviewed for this article, or why it isn’t reflected in official documents or media accounts from the time.

“At this point I can only say is [sic] I remembered back as best I could,” he wrote in an email.

Wren also acknowledged that he has no documentation from 2010 through 2012 to support his assertions that he understood the phrase “established by the state” could mean that subsidies wouldn’t be available in federal exchanges. The Alabama legislature does not transcribe floor or committee proceedings, so no official record exists of the debate on Wren’s bill.

Wren was often quoted in the local and national press speaking about the advantages of state-run health insurance exchanges in 2011 and 2012, but HuffPost couldn’t find any articles that cited him saying the subsidies wouldn’t be available in federal exchanges.

What defined Alabama's debate over the exchange wasn’t the availability of subsidies. At first, policymakers focused on matters such as how to finance the exchange. Over time, the shifting politics of Obamacare drove action -- and inaction -- in Alabama as Republicans nationwide coalesced around a strategy of complete opposition and obstruction of the law.

Led by Wren -- and initially by Bentley -- Alabama gave sincere consideration to the idea of setting up a health insurance exchange. Prior to becoming governor, Bentley declared that he supported health insurance exchanges, and it was part of his agenda when he took office in 2011. In the meantime, Wren, McClendon and other lawmakers in favor of an Alabama-run exchange were working on the issue in the legislature, but didn't progress so far as a committee vote that year.

The likelihood of a state-run exchange dwindled throughout 2012. The U.S. Supreme Court was set to rule on a previous lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and expansion of the Medicaid program. And former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) was challenging Obama’s re-election bid with a vow to repeal Obamacare. Like many other governors from both parties at the time, Bentley cited uncertainty about the court and about the election as reasons to delay making a decision on the exchange.

There were other signs indicating that Bentley’s support for a state exchange was cooling. Three months after his commission recommended a state exchange, the governor dismissed the report, saying ''I'm just not very enthusiastic about it," according to The Birmingham News. In April 2012, Wren complained to the press about campaigns by national anti-Obamacare groups undermining support for his plan. Soon afterward, the Alabama state House approved legislation to establish a state exchange without a single dissenting vote, but the state Senate stalled that legislation in May. The same month, Bentley’s office announced that he would veto the House-passed bill, calling it premature.

Finally, Romney lost, and in December 2012, Bentley announced that Alabama wouldn’t establish an exchange nor expand Medicaid, citing the cost. Bentley also articulated his desire to maintain a united front against Obamacare with his fellow Republican governors, most of whom took the same stance.

The announcement marked Bentley’s first public reference to the legal issue that would ultimately become King v. Burwell. Bentley mentioned the first such lawsuit to make this argument, which Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt (R) filed in September 2012, but Bentley apparently misunderstood its consequences.

According to a report by Alabama Media Group, Bentley evidently believed the Oklahoma lawsuit would invalidate federal exchanges entirely, not merely the subsidies. "We believe the federally facilitated system they will try to set up, we believe that is unconstitutional," Bentley was quoted as saying.

A Bentley spokeswoman didn’t respond to emailed questions for this story. Reported by Huffington Post 20 hours ago.