The nation's leaders are grappling with at least three seemingly difficult issues: Immigration, health care and taxes.
I would suggest the following.
On immigration illegal and legal.
I believe that we must stop all illegal immigration.
We should not allow it but instead make it less necessary. People are dying to leave their beloved countries to come to America. They want to leave because of crime, poverty and/or corruption. Many are advised to claim asylum by their lawyers. Most want to come to America, the land of milk and honey whose streets are paved with gold. We also have a much lower crime rate. Mexico and Central American nations have some of the highest.
Who can blame them. Wouldn't we do the same?
My plan is to close the southern border and have those wanting to claim asylum go to the nearest American consulate in their country. Their issue can be checked there. Those approved for asylum will be transported for free to the U.S.
In order to reduce the massive crime rate, we should send our special forces down there. They can fight the many gang members responsible for the crimes. It would be a large version of the "Magnificent Seven."
We should also send Americans with business experience to help change the economic system so that the poor get paid more and get better education and training.
Then there would little cause to come two thousand miles and pay thousands of dollars to gang members.
On legal immigration I agree that only spouses and their children would be able to come and the spouse who sponsored them must be responsible for accommodating their needs. I think that we should end the lottery in favor of the merit based policy.
On fixing the Affordable Care Act.
We have to face the fact that the ACA is seriously flawed. Insurers have withdrawn from the market leaving one out of three applicants with only one company to choose from. Knowing that they had a captive audience, they have raised their rates to make a profit after insuring the disabled. It was forcing everyone to get coverage to offset the costs incurred by the disabled.
The argument has been that everyone has to sign up to the full plan even though they don't need it to take care of the others. Also it was argued that if someone doesn't have coverage, we have to pay for it if he goes to the emergency. The average monthly ACA payment is a little more than $1,000 and there are some deductibles. So a healthy person must pay as much for an emergency care with an average cost at a bit more than $1,000 ( before the usual discount.) So a healthy person would have to go to the E.R about 15 times a year to get the average monthly amount to have $1,000 paid through insurance.
Which costs us more - a healthy young person who does everything to stay healthy and rarely needs medical attention, or the unhealthy person who abuses drugs and goes to the E.R. frequently while on Medicaid or Medicare? We all pay for that.
But don't we need the healthy to offset the cost incurred by the unhealthy?
Here's my idea is to continue to making enrollment voluntary as it was recently changed to. Let private insurers deny coverage to anyone with health problems. Those denied coverage would immediately be eligible to the "public option" which would be a federal program with a share of cost depending on income.
The insures would rush back in the market competing for the healthy applicants. They would lower rates and perhaps get ride of the deductible. They should also be able to offer a policy that just covers the base medical needs. The reduced plan would only cover medically necessary hospital costs; office and clinic visits; medicine and other medical supplies; and lab tests.This plan could be much less expensive making it more attractive for their voluntary applicants.
We would end our annual $8 billion dollar subsidy to insurers. This amount could somewhat offset the additional cost of the "public option."
On fixing the Federal income tax code.
This administration made the tax code simpler and more affordable. I think that it should have gone further. I think that there should no itemized deductions that mainly help the rich. Instead there should be a standard deduction of $20,000 for singles and $40,000 for families. All income sources would be equally taxable. So $40,000 from dividends, interest, social security benefits or earned income (minus the FICA deduction) would be considered equally taxable. There could be four brackets from 10% to 25% up to $500,000. Those making $500,000 to just under $1 million would pay a straight 30%. So someone earning $600,000 would pay $180,000. A family making over $1 million would pay a straight 35%. So a family making $2 million would pay $700,000 in federal tax alone. This would free the IRS to focus on the self employed and businesses.
I would suggest the following.
On immigration illegal and legal.
I believe that we must stop all illegal immigration.
We should not allow it but instead make it less necessary. People are dying to leave their beloved countries to come to America. They want to leave because of crime, poverty and/or corruption. Many are advised to claim asylum by their lawyers. Most want to come to America, the land of milk and honey whose streets are paved with gold. We also have a much lower crime rate. Mexico and Central American nations have some of the highest.
Who can blame them. Wouldn't we do the same?
My plan is to close the southern border and have those wanting to claim asylum go to the nearest American consulate in their country. Their issue can be checked there. Those approved for asylum will be transported for free to the U.S.
In order to reduce the massive crime rate, we should send our special forces down there. They can fight the many gang members responsible for the crimes. It would be a large version of the "Magnificent Seven."
We should also send Americans with business experience to help change the economic system so that the poor get paid more and get better education and training.
Then there would little cause to come two thousand miles and pay thousands of dollars to gang members.
On legal immigration I agree that only spouses and their children would be able to come and the spouse who sponsored them must be responsible for accommodating their needs. I think that we should end the lottery in favor of the merit based policy.
On fixing the Affordable Care Act.
We have to face the fact that the ACA is seriously flawed. Insurers have withdrawn from the market leaving one out of three applicants with only one company to choose from. Knowing that they had a captive audience, they have raised their rates to make a profit after insuring the disabled. It was forcing everyone to get coverage to offset the costs incurred by the disabled.
The argument has been that everyone has to sign up to the full plan even though they don't need it to take care of the others. Also it was argued that if someone doesn't have coverage, we have to pay for it if he goes to the emergency. The average monthly ACA payment is a little more than $1,000 and there are some deductibles. So a healthy person must pay as much for an emergency care with an average cost at a bit more than $1,000 ( before the usual discount.) So a healthy person would have to go to the E.R about 15 times a year to get the average monthly amount to have $1,000 paid through insurance.
Which costs us more - a healthy young person who does everything to stay healthy and rarely needs medical attention, or the unhealthy person who abuses drugs and goes to the E.R. frequently while on Medicaid or Medicare? We all pay for that.
But don't we need the healthy to offset the cost incurred by the unhealthy?
Here's my idea is to continue to making enrollment voluntary as it was recently changed to. Let private insurers deny coverage to anyone with health problems. Those denied coverage would immediately be eligible to the "public option" which would be a federal program with a share of cost depending on income.
The insures would rush back in the market competing for the healthy applicants. They would lower rates and perhaps get ride of the deductible. They should also be able to offer a policy that just covers the base medical needs. The reduced plan would only cover medically necessary hospital costs; office and clinic visits; medicine and other medical supplies; and lab tests.This plan could be much less expensive making it more attractive for their voluntary applicants.
We would end our annual $8 billion dollar subsidy to insurers. This amount could somewhat offset the additional cost of the "public option."
On fixing the Federal income tax code.
This administration made the tax code simpler and more affordable. I think that it should have gone further. I think that there should no itemized deductions that mainly help the rich. Instead there should be a standard deduction of $20,000 for singles and $40,000 for families. All income sources would be equally taxable. So $40,000 from dividends, interest, social security benefits or earned income (minus the FICA deduction) would be considered equally taxable. There could be four brackets from 10% to 25% up to $500,000. Those making $500,000 to just under $1 million would pay a straight 30%. So someone earning $600,000 would pay $180,000. A family making over $1 million would pay a straight 35%. So a family making $2 million would pay $700,000 in federal tax alone. This would free the IRS to focus on the self employed and businesses.
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