Using Taxes to Reform Health Insurance

Pitfalls and Promises

Henry J. Aaron, Leonard E. Burman, Henry Aaron, Leonard E. Burman

• Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN:
  9780815701255
• eBook ISBN:
  9780815701972
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Health Policy

Few people realize that one of the nation's largest health programs runs through the tax system. Reformers of all stripes propose to modify current tax rules as part of larger programs to increase coverage and control costs. Is the current system working? Will tax-based reforms achieve their goals? Several of the nation's foremost experts on taxation and health policy address these questions in Using Taxes to Reform Health Insurance, a joint product of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center and the American Tax Policy Institute. Led by respected economists Henry Aaron of the Brookings Institution and Leonard Burman of the Urban Institute, contributors examine the role taxes currently play, the likely effects of recently introduced health savings accounts, the challenges of administering major subsidies for health insurance through the tax system, and options for using the tax system to expand health insurance coverage. No taxpayer or consumer of health care services can afford to ignore these issues.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Information
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Tax Policy and the History of the Health Insurance Industry
• The Tax Code, Employer-Sponsored Insurance, and the Distribution of Tax Subsides
• Health Savings Accounts: Recent Trends and Potential Effects on Coverage and Health Insurance Markets
• What's in a Name? Are Health Savings Accounts Really Health Savings Accounts?
• Tax Subsidies for Out-of-Pocket Health Care Costs
• Administrative Issues: Challenges of the Current System
• The Challenges of Implementing Health Reform thorough the Tax System
• Reforming the Tax Treatment of Health Care: Right Ways and Wrong Ways
• Simple Humans, Complex Insurance, Subtle Subsities
• Taxes and Health Insurance
• Contributors
• Index
• Back Cover