Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist sent the following letter to the U.S. House of Representatives today:

On Wednesday, the U.S. House of Representatives will vote to repeal President Obama’s signature healthcare law, known as “Obamacare.”  This is one of the most important votes of this Congress.  Americans for Tax Reform considers this to be a key vote.

Obamacare is one of the largest tax hikes in American history.  While many rightly decry Obamacare as a government healthcare bill (and it is), it’s also a gargantuan tax hike.  Once fully phased-in, Obamacare contains around $1 trillion in higher taxes over a decade.  In all, there are 20 new or higher taxes in Obamacare, the most notorious being the individual mandate’s non-compliance penalty.

Because Obamacare is a large tax hike, repealing Obamacare is likely to be the largest tax cut passed out of the House this Congress.  Obamacare is a bill that will cost American jobs, and one of the biggest reasons why is all the new taxes.  Getting these tax increases out of the pipeline will increase employer certainty and allow money to stay in the hands of job creators, not Washington bureaucrats.

Some tax hikes have already taken effect, and need to be repealed immediately.  Obamacare is phased in over several years, and some provisions (including tax hikes) have already taken effect.  The 10 percent tax on tanning salons went into effect in July 2010.  Starting in January 2011, American families found that they no longer were allowed to use their pre-tax FSAs or HSAs to purchase non-prescription, over-the-counter medicines.  People forced in these difficult economic times to withdraw from their HSAs for non-medical reasons saw their “surtax” rise from 10 to 20 percent, creating effective tax rates on this emergency choice as high as 60 percent.  The IRS is now allowed to disallow perfectly-legal tax deductions because they claim the write-offs lack “economic substance.”  

Most of the remaining tax hikes will soon take effect, and Obamacare needs to be repealed before they do.  Many of the worst Obamacare tax hikes come online on
January 1, 2013.  These include the 3.8 percentage point surtax on investment activity, the new tax on medical devices, the higher 3.8 percent Medicare payroll tax, a tax on high medical bills, and many more.  In 2014, the mandate taxes themselves go into effect.

I would urge all Congressmen who support taxpayers to support the repeal of Obamacare.

PDF of Letter

Posted by Ryan Ellis on Tuesday, July 10, 2012 12:52 PM EDT

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