James Pethokoukis

Ezra Klein notices that the value-added tax option to pay for healthcare reform is still floating around. Not a good idea, he says:

Levying a VAT to pay for coverage of the uninsured seems like a quick way to kill health-care reform. For the 85 percent of Americans with health insurance coverage, the VAT would be nothing but a charity tax. It wouldn’t buy them anything, as it does in the European systems. It wouldn’t free them from premiums, as it does in the Emmanuel/Fuchs voucher program. Republicans would view it as a major new tax. If Congress wants to rebuild American health care around a VAT, that’s probably a good idea. But simply slapping a new national sales tax atop the existing system? That doesn’t get you anything in terms of efficiency, and it’s going to scare the hell out of the middle class.