[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 2]
[House]
[Page 2190]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1410
             MEDICARE ADVANTAGE AND THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT

  (Mr. BURGESS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, the Affordable Care Act was passed now 
almost 3 years ago, and the Affordable Care Act was going to lower 
costs. And why wouldn't you like it? You get free stuff.
  Well, how do you pay for that free stuff?
  It turns out five new taxes were started on January of this year. 
What are they, and who do they affect?
  Well, there's a big tax on medical devices. Now everyone talks about 
wanting to encourage American investment, encourage American 
manufacturing. But with this tax we're encouraging manufacturers to go 
offshore.
  Flexible spending accounts are now limited. Who's affected by 
flexible spending accounts? Well, people with predictable recurrent 
medical expenses who might want to set some of those dollars aside and 
pay for them with pretax dollars. Those amounts are now limited, so 
people with chronic illnesses, families with special needs children are 
going to be affected.
  There's a surtax on investment income. The economy's trying to 
recover. Why would we tax investment income?
  Itemized deductions are now going to be limited for people who 
itemize their deductions. So who is affected by that? People with the 
highest medical expenses.
  And then finally, the Medicare payroll tax hike. Might sound like a 
good idea. Medicare might need more money, but this money doesn't go to 
Medicare. This money goes to fund new programs.
  Look, 3 years ago we were all told, if you like what you have, you 
can keep it. If you like your insurance, you can keep it. If you like 
your doctor, you can keep him or her.
  Turns out, what we should have been hearing is, you're going to pay a 
lot more to get a lot less.

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