User Panel
Posted: 1/3/2012 7:10:47 PM EDT
A year from now, the federal government will start collecting a new tax on medical devices from tongue depressors to imaging machines, thanks to the sweeping health-care overhaul that Democrats enacted in the spring of 2010. People in the industry say it’s already having an effect. In November, citing the new tax, Stryker Corp. (SYK), whose products include artificial hips and knees, announced that it would let go about 1,000 of its workers. Earlier last year, Covidien Plc (COV), maker of surgical instruments, said it would lay off 200 workers in the U.S. and move production to Costa Rica and Mexico. It, too, cited the tax. Other companies in the field have announced similar measures –– or plans to expand production overseas but not in the U.S. –– without mentioning the tax. The sluggish economy is clearly part of the explanation, but the medical-devices industry had been a relative bright spot within U.S. manufacturing, losing only 1.1 percent of its employees during 2007-2008 while manufacturing as a whole lost 4.8 percent. A study done for AdvaMed, a trade association for the industry, claims the tax could ultimately cost more than 45,000 jobs. Medical-device companies employ more than 400,000 Americans. Their wages are higher than the national average. The U.S. is a net exporter of medical devices. The tax will change these numbers for the worse. It will be levied at 2.3 percent of sales; on average, profits make up less than 4 percent of sales in the industry. The AdvaMed study concludes, "The new 2.3 percent excise tax will roughly double their total tax bill and raise the average effective corporate income tax rate to one of the highest effective tax rates faced by any industry in the world.” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-03/tongue-depressor-tax-will-harm-jobs-innovation-ramesh-ponnuru.html |
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So those who don't leave the country on their own get a helpful push by the gov. All part of the plan.
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Interesting thoughts from a poster on Reason.com:
The Obama Administration saw money spent on R&D for new medical devices as a drain on the system. The Obama Administration wants healthcare providers to stop using their resources on new and better treatments and start using their resources to provide more standard care to more people. In other words, the Obama Administration saw this as a feature rather than a bug. They think that the more they discourage healthcare providers from spending on new equipment and new devices, the more it will encourage healthcare providers to spend that money on giving more people access to the hospital. It's very much in line with the Obama Administration's severe tax on "Cadillac Insurance Plans", where they hit you with an enormous tax if your company's health insurance plan is especially generous. The Obama Administration sees high quality healthcare as part of the problem––and discouraging people from getting it as part of the solution. They wanted everyone to get a minimum amount of healthcare with a minimum level of quality––and anything above and beyond those minimum levels they saw as part of the problem. |
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"The new 2.3 percent excise tax will roughly double their total tax bill and raise the average effective corporate income tax rate to one of the highest effective tax rates faced by any industry in the world.”
MAYBE THIS IS WHY HEALTH CARE IS SO EXPENSIVE? Nah, can't be, government is the solution! |
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We build medical electronics where I work. I foresee huge chunks of our work going away.
Its baffling that they'd tax one of the high end products that's primarily made here, in addition to the already heavy FDA regulation and slow bureaucracy. Its almost like they don't want us to succeed. ETA: dammit I was going to bed. Now I'm pissed again. |
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But, but, Health Care will now be FREE!!!!
Fucking stupid idiots. |
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Talk about killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Worth repeating. |
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Its almost like they don't want us to succeed. You must understand that liberals function in a warped notion of reality. People have made endless fun of Sarah Palin for questioning evolution, but nobody seems to make fun of liberals for what is essentially an entirely faith based system of governance. See, they believe certain facts about the world that are demonstrably untrue if you examine empirical data. Data like the medical implantation data cited by Ponru would be eminently useful in testing the assumptions underlying their grand plans...but that isn't really necessary for liberals. They believe that medical device manufacturers are going to get a windfall, and therefore they act accordingly. Their faith is sufficient as a reason to tax the hell out of an important part of providing healthcare all in the name of making it more affordable because that's how it should work in their minds. Reality rarely intrudes into their thought process. (For other examples, see Pelosi labeling food stamps as the most effective "stimulus" available) There's also their beliefs about fairness. It's patently unfair, you see, for someone who has worked all their life to get a knee replacement so they can continue a productive life when an inner city mother doesn't have sufficient prenatal care. That's an inequity that really should be remedied. So tax the replacement knee to help fund the prenatal care for the inner city mother. See? They've just made the system more fair! That they have the economic sophistication of a toddler is irrelevant...they are the smart ones in our society. So it's not really that they expressly want to drive medical device manufacturing out of the United States. It's that their poor underdeveloped, superstition-addled, faith based world view cannot process the economic realities caused by their policy proposals. If they are ever aware of unpleasant consequences, they must rationalize it as the result of "greed" or as being someone else's fault lest their singular conceit in their mastery of the universe be weakened, which would cause an utter and complete collapse of their self image. Without the absolute assurance that they are wiser and better than the rest of the plebes in every possible way they would shrivel into nothingness. So that must be preserved. |
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But, but, Health Care will now be FREE!!!! Fucking stupid idiots. Our country is on her way to becoming a third world shithole...There will be two types of people when .Gov is finished, the elite and the beggar.. I have to believe this is all by design. Because people cannot accidentally partake in such stupidity. |
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Wanna know the cool part? The Stryker family is rather liberal.
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If only the conservatives would use these examples against the progressives.
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Its almost like they don't want us to succeed. You must understand that liberals function in a warped notion of reality. People have made endless fun of Sarah Palin for questioning evolution, but nobody seems to make fun of liberals for what is essentially an entirely faith based system of governance. See, they believe certain facts about the world that are demonstrably untrue if you examine empirical data. Data like the medical implantation data cited by Ponru would be eminently useful in testing the assumptions underlying their grand plans...but that isn't really necessary for liberals. They believe that medical device manufacturers are going to get a windfall, and therefore they act accordingly. Their faith is sufficient as a reason to tax the hell out of an important part of providing healthcare all in the name of making it more affordable because that's how it should work in their minds. Reality rarely intrudes into their thought process. (For other examples, see Pelosi labeling food stamps as the most effective "stimulus" available) There's also their beliefs about fairness. It's patently unfair, you see, for someone who has worked all their life to get a knee replacement so they can continue a productive life when an inner city mother doesn't have sufficient prenatal care. That's an inequity that really should be remedied. So tax the replacement knee to help fund the prenatal care for the inner city mother. See? They've just made the system more fair! That they have the economic sophistication of a toddler is irrelevant...they are the smart ones in our society. So it's not really that they expressly want to drive medical device manufacturing out of the United States. It's that their poor underdeveloped, superstition-addled, faith based world view cannot process the economic realities caused by their policy proposals. If they are ever aware of unpleasant consequences, they must rationalize it as the result of "greed" or as being someone else's fault lest their singular conceit in their mastery of the universe be weakened, which would cause an utter and complete collapse of their self image. Without the absolute assurance that they are wiser and better than the rest of the plebes in every possible way they would shrivel into nothingness. So that must be preserved. Excellent post. |
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business?
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? . It will be levied at 2.3 percent of sales; on average, profits make up less than 4 percent of sales in the industry. So, it's basically a 58% tax on profits. |
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If only some sort of government organization was tasked with debating and determining the likely outcome of legislation before it was made into law, we wouldn't have these problems.
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There's also their beliefs about fairness. It's patently unfair, you see, for someone who has worked all their life to get a knee replacement so they can continue a productive life when an inner city mother doesn't have sufficient prenatal care. That's an inequity that really should be remedied. So tax the replacement knee to help fund the prenatal care for the inner city mother. See? They've just made the system more fair! Hell, if it worked out that way at least someone would benefit. What happens most of the time is that they tax whatever "unfair" activity they identify as immoral, then spend 3 times the revenue that the tax brings in. That's the biggest problem I have with this tax the rich bullshit. And it's not like I have a soft spot for rich people either. It's that these tax increases are sold as some kind of solution, but they don't even address the problem. |
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? Massive math failure here. Paying a 2.3% tax on your gross revenue is a lot different than passing through an 11% excise tax to the distributor. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? . It will be levied at 2.3 percent of sales; on average, profits make up less than 4 percent of sales in the industry. So, it's basically a 58% tax on profits. That's gonna hurt. So much for development of new equipment, and get ready for lots of things going into the autoclave. Medical equipment is already a PITA to develop secondary to regulation. What the dumbasses in Washington don't seem to understand (or maybe they do, and they are trying to make this country fail) is that prices for that equipment is going to go up, or they move manufacturing to another country to lower production cost so they can try to offset the tax penalty. Either way, America gets fucked. |
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? Massive math failure here. Paying a 2.3% tax on your gross revenue is a lot different than passing through an 11% excise tax to the distributor. No math failure here. You obviously never held an 07 or 10 FFL. The 11% FET is paid by the manufacturer on the sales price of the finished goods. ALL taxes are passed along to the consumer, in any industry. The quote in this thread calls it an excise tax. That is how an excise tax works. Paying a tax on your gross is a gross receipts tax. Completely different tax. So is this a gross receipts tax? or an FET? My point is that if a 2.3% FET (as described in a previous quote) is going to cripple an industry that big, imagine how badly the 11% cripples the firearm industry. No failure here, massive or otherwise. . |
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If only some sort of government organization was tasked with debating and determining the likely outcome of legislation before it was made into law, we wouldn't have these problems. nazi pelosi said we had to pass the bill to see what was in it. |
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? Massive math failure here. Paying a 2.3% tax on your gross revenue is a lot different than passing through an 11% excise tax to the distributor. No math failure here. You obviously never held an 07 or 10 FFL. The 11% FET is paid by the manufacturer on the sales price of the finished goods. ALL taxes are passed along to the consumer, in any industry. The quote in this thread calls it an excise tax. That is how an excise tax works. Paying a tax on your gross is a gross receipts tax. Completely different tax. So is this a gross receipts tax? or an FET? My point is that if a 2.3% FET (as described in a previous quote) is going to cripple an industry that big, imagine how badly the 11% cripples the firearm industry. No failure here, massive or otherwise. . Ummmm... I currently hold an 07/C2. I know very well how FAET is calculated on firearms as I file those returns regularly (ok, my company does) and ATF-TTB was quite helpful when I started years ago in how to figure them out. It's certainly not calculated based on my gross sales as the 2.3% FET is on medical devices, as stated in the article. |
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If only the conservatives would use these examples against the progressives. They're too busy stabbing each other n the back. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Its almost like they don't want us to succeed. You must understand that liberals function in a warped notion of reality. People have made endless fun of Sarah Palin for questioning evolution, but nobody seems to make fun of liberals for what is essentially an entirely faith based system of governance. See, they believe certain facts about the world that are demonstrably untrue if you examine empirical data. Data like the medical implantation data cited by Ponru would be eminently useful in testing the assumptions underlying their grand plans...but that isn't really necessary for liberals. They believe that medical device manufacturers are going to get a windfall, and therefore they act accordingly. Their faith is sufficient as a reason to tax the hell out of an important part of providing healthcare all in the name of making it more affordable because that's how it should work in their minds. Reality rarely intrudes into their thought process. (For other examples, see Pelosi labeling food stamps as the most effective "stimulus" available) There's also their beliefs about fairness. It's patently unfair, you see, for someone who has worked all their life to get a knee replacement so they can continue a productive life when an inner city mother doesn't have sufficient prenatal care. That's an inequity that really should be remedied. So tax the replacement knee to help fund the prenatal care for the inner city mother. See? They've just made the system more fair! That they have the economic sophistication of a toddler is irrelevant...they are the smart ones in our society. So it's not really that they expressly want to drive medical device manufacturing out of the United States. It's that their poor underdeveloped, superstition-addled, faith based world view cannot process the economic realities caused by their policy proposals. If they are ever aware of unpleasant consequences, they must rationalize it as the result of "greed" or as being someone else's fault lest their singular conceit in their mastery of the universe be weakened, which would cause an utter and complete collapse of their self image. Without the absolute assurance that they are wiser and better than the rest of the plebes in every possible way they would shrivel into nothingness. So that must be preserved. Excellent post. Agreed. |
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Huh. a piddly little 2.3% FET is going to destroy the medical devices business? So what effect does that 11% FET have on the gun business? Massive math failure here. Paying a 2.3% tax on your gross revenue is a lot different than passing through an 11% excise tax to the distributor. No math failure here. You obviously never held an 07 or 10 FFL. The 11% FET is paid by the manufacturer on the sales price of the finished goods. ALL taxes are passed along to the consumer, in any industry. The quote in this thread calls it an excise tax. That is how an excise tax works. Paying a tax on your gross is a gross receipts tax. Completely different tax. So is this a gross receipts tax? or an FET? My point is that if a 2.3% FET (as described in a previous quote) is going to cripple an industry that big, imagine how badly the 11% cripples the firearm industry. No failure here, massive or otherwise. . Ummmm... I currently hold an 07/C2. I know very well how FAET is calculated on firearms as I file those returns regularly (ok, my company does) and ATF-TTB was quite helpful when I started years ago in how to figure them out. It's certainly not calculated based on my gross sales as the 2.3% FET is on medical devices, as stated in the article. So, if all you sold were completed firearms or suppressors, you would pay 11% FET on every thing you sold. Same goes for a medical device excise tax, as stated in that article. All they make are devices, so it all gets taxed. On the sale price the first time it changes hands. Just like the firearm industry. . |
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innovation and advancement ultimately leads to better care even for the poor that don't pay
but stupid liberals don't understand these things and would rather have stagnant crappy care for all |
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This...and there's a forthcoming 27% cut to medicare coming.
IIRC not just a few years ago there was a 24% cut in medicare reimbursement. They're determined to destroy healthcare in the US. |
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This...and there's a forthcoming 27% cut to medicare coming. IIRC not just a few years ago there was a 24% cut in medicare reimbursement. They're determined to destroy healthcare in the US. Not Exactly. Medicare has a "Sustained Growth Rate Formula". They basically say "we can't afford to pay out more than xx dollars a year, and grow at yy rate". To meet those goals, we need to cut what we pay Doctors (and Hospitals, etc.) by 1% next year (or 1.5%, or 1.9%, etc.). Sorry but I haven't noticed too many prices going DOWN...yet Medicare (and EVERYONE...private insurance, Tricare, etc.) follows Medicare rates to some extent...so if Medicare goes down, everyone else goes down. So with typical lack of foresight, Congress every year pushes the cuts back a bit. A few years ago it was 24%, now it's up to 29%. To 'balance' the Obama Care plan (and so the liberals could claim that it won't cost any money)...they had to tell the Congressional Budget Office to leave the "Doc Fix" or Sustainable Growth Rate cuts IN PLACE...i.e...to balance the Obama plan they had to plan to cut reimbursement by 27%. EVERYONE in congress (both sides) admitted that they knew they couldn't do that, so they put the "hey, let's delay the cuts" bill off until AFTER Obamacare was passed. So, Doctors still lobby to fix it. How many retirees could afford a 1/3 cut in their SS checks? Could you afford a 1/3 pay cut? Could a business drop all their prices by 1/3 and survive? Typical Government Bullshit. AFARR |
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Quoted: If only some sort of government organization was tasked with debating and determining the likely outcome of legislation before it was made into law, we wouldn't have these problems. what a concept............... |
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Quoted: Just make plastic toung depressors and keep reusing them works well with syringes That's how they roll in China and Russia http://articles.sfgate.com/1998-10-27/news/17734505_1_syringes-health-workers-time-bomb/13 but hey its free |
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If only some sort of government organization was tasked with debating and determining the likely outcome of legislation before it was made into law, we wouldn't have these problems. what a concept............... That's the "Neutral" Congressional Budget Office. However..... They go by what numbers they are given by Congress (either party). See my example above...to "Balance" the Obamacare (make it 'revenue neutral', as the Dems claim)...they had to factor in cuts that weren't going to happen. But, because the White House/Dems said "Figure it with these cuts in place"...they had to do it that way. AFARR |
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