Most of the provisions of Obama-Care have not yet taken effect, but we are already seeing the need to head off some new costs and bureaucracy that ObamaCare will impose.
It’s of great concern that such problems are arising, since the Obama administration, congressional Democrats and frequent news reports claimed that ObamaCare would reduce – not increase – costs and bureaucracy. But maybe it is not so strange that troubles are showing up, since the law runs many hundreds of pages – and few in Congress even claim they have read it.
One little-noticed part of the new law is a requirement that businesses file “1099” tax forms for every vendor from whom they buy more than $600 worth of goods. They also have to send copies of the filings to each vendor.
The Democrats who wrote the ObamaCare legislation inserted this requirement to make sure vendors weren’t getting away with paying too little in taxes, and to raise $19 billion or so in revenue. They planned to use the extra taxes as a way to help fund ObamaCare.
But Democrats and Republicans alike have been flooded with complaints that the tax form requirement will heavily burden businesses and the IRS with additional paperwork. The IRS itself has sounded the alarm, with its “taxpayer advocate” noting that the rule could “turn out to be disproportionate as compared with any resulting improvement in tax compliance.”
So now, there are efforts in Congress to change the requirement. But Republicans and Democrats cannot agree on how to do so. Republicans want to repeal the new rule altogether and cut spending in other parts of ObamaCare to make up for the lost revenue. But Democrats want only to narrow the rule to hit fewer businesses – and to raise taxes on “Big Oil” companies to make up for the lost revenue. What they don’t mention is that raising taxes on “Big Oil” would raise taxes on “everyone” by increasing the price we pay for gasoline.
So far, efforts to correct this bureaucratic nightmare have failed.
Ironically, The New York Times pointed out that the new tax-reporting requirement “drew little attention” when ObamaCare legislation was introduced, “and many lawmakers were apparently unaware of it when they voted for final passage of the legislation.”
We can only imagine how many more “surprises” ObamaCare will be springing on American businesses and taxpayers over the next few years.