A proposal from Travis County’s Central Health district and the privately held Seton Healthcare Family would see taxpayers footing the bill for families earning $91,000 per year.
According to Pew Research, Americans are considered middle class when they earn between $47,000 and $141,000. So the Travis County/Seton proposal would have those whose earnings are in the upper-half of middle class receiving subsidized health care.
Austin boasts a “family median income” of more than $63,000. (Remember: this proposal is to subsidize healthcare for households making more than $90,000!)
Advocates for the proposal illogically claim that by multiplying the number of people receiving subsidized health care, the costs would be lowered. In fact, this is about taxpayers subsidizing profits for Seton.
Under an agreement to build a “teaching hospital” for the University of Texas, the Austin American Statesman reports that Austin-based Seton (which is a private entity) is allowed to “decide with [the government agency] who should be eligible for taxpayer-subsidized health care services.”
What could possibly go wrong?
Let’s be clear: this is socialism at its worst. A private entity padding its bottom-line with taxpayer dollars in the name of “serving the poor” – in this case, the “poor” being the upper middle class. And so where does that padding coming from…?
Margaret Thatcher diagnosed the unhealthy outcome of such schemes: “They have the usual socialist disease; they have run out of other people’s money.”
With the majority of the people riding the fast-train to socialist serfdom, bankruptcy is the final destination.
