Thursday, December 2, 2010

Jonathan Cohn: The Senate's Object Lesson

The always brilliant Jonathan Cohn on why repealing health reform isn't quite as easy as it may have sounded.

Jonathan explains this week's efforts to repeal the requirement that small businesses file 1099 forms for all vendors from whom they purchase goods or services over $600. The business community -- including me -- are concerned about how burdensome this is, having to file a 1099 for every office supply company, printer, copy service -- all of the things that any business must spend at least $600 per year on. But when the Senate tried to eliminate it this week, they were unable to do so. Sure, they could repeal, but they couldn't figure out how to "replace" the revenue that is estimated to flow from this provision. There were two proposals, but they both failed.

So if there's no agreement on how to address a provision of reform that is pretty universally disliked and that is very small in the greater scheme of things, how does the GOP think it will repeal and replace the whole law? Not so simple, says Jonathan Cohn. I agree. But then again, I almost always agree with Jonathan. Jennifer

No comments:

Post a Comment