On May 29, 2024, Paragon’s latest paper “Follow the Money: How Tax Policy Shapes Health Care,” by Brian Blase and Theo Merkel, was referenced in Politico.
From the article:
PITCHING HEALTH TAX CHANGES — With the impending expiration of the Trump administration’s tax cuts, former Trump advisers are calling for Congress to change the tax code to bolster efficiency.
“The sheer size of the revenue impact of health care tax provisions is … unrivaled anywhere else in the American economy,” Theo Merkel and Brian Blase of the conservative Paragon Health Institute wrote. “Any policymaker seeking to improve the value of health care provided to Americans today would find a target rich environment in the tax code.”
The details: The proposal released today would allow more plans to take advantage of health savings accounts, end tax credits for Affordable Care Act marketplace plan premiums and remove obstacles for individual coverage health reimbursement arrangements, or ICHRAs. The Trump administration expanded those arrangements, allowing employers to provide tax-exempt subsidies to help workers purchase Obamacare plans.
Merkel and Blase, who were leading officials on Trump’s White House’s National Economic Council, also called for:
— Curbing restrictions on Medicare medical savings accounts
— Allowing flexible spending account holders to roll over unused balances into health savings accounts
— Ending the Small Business Health Care Tax Credit, saying there are “more efficient” ways to aid small businesses in offering insurance, including expanding association health plans and ICHRAs
The full article can be found in Politico.
