Health Care Tax Hike

As Congress moves forward with passing a massively unpopular health care bill, the tax hikes included in the current plan are becoming more apparent.

Fortune Magazine astutely points out a major change in how Medicare tax is now applied.

"Since its conception, the Medicare tax has always been tied to payrolls. Every paycheck, employers and employees each chip in 1.45%, regardless of how much someone makes. Under Obama's proposal -- which should be very close to what Congress winds up enacting -- a Medicare tax would now be applied to investment income too: Individuals who earn more than $200,000 and couples over $250,000 would pay an additional 2.9% surtax on unearned income from interest, dividends, annuities, royalties and rents."

For now, only a relatively few higher-income people will be subject to this new tax.

However, in future years as Congress determines that it needs more and more revenues to pay for this "deficit reducing" health care overhaul, that threshold will go down. That's how the game works.

Until the American people finally wake up and change the rules so that Congress and the people who elect them cannot keep stealing from hard-working Americans.