ACA/Obamacare: For Whom the Pixie Dust Tolls

‘"I can't afford to go out and buy insurance while trying to start a business," said Willmus, of Colorado Springs, Colo. "Obamacare will allow me to be more comfortable at risking what I own." ’

‘Craig Mason, 59, said he has felt tied to his job as an engineer at a large defense contractor because he and his wife needed health insurance. A diabetic, he couldn't get affordable coverage on the individual market.

Now, however, he's thinking of leaving his employer in a few years to focus more on his side job, repairing and building guitars and other string instruments. He also wants to spend more time with his three grandchildren.

"I want to try something different," said Mason, a Germantown, Md., resident. "I don't want to be tied to a large corporation. The Affordable Care Act may be just the vehicle to bridge the gap until I'm eligible for Medicare." ’ - I'm quitting my job. Thanks Obamacare! yahoo.com, 02/25/2014


Apparently Ms. Willmus and Mr. Mason attribute their good fortune to Obamacare or The Affordable Care Act. Ostensibly the entity by the name Obamacare or Affordable Care Act is an exogenous entity that bestows low cost health insurance by its own means. Yes, the proverbial pixie dust generator!

Ms. Willmus and Mr. Mason have forgotten that other taxpayers are the means. That exogenous taxpayers are coercively made to cause the good fortune of a recipient class which Ms. Willmus and Mr. Mason have chosen to join. How very nice indeed!

Link to the Yahoo article appears below:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/im-quitting-job-thanks-obamacare-120600325.html


　

　

Director's law

When the Taxpayer Is Also the Recipient

The video above is a discussion of future unfunded pension obligations regarding public sector workers of the city of San Diego, CA. A referendum will soon appear for voters to decide upon new hires of the city of San Diego having a 401k-type retirement plan rather than extending to new hires the defined pension plan currently in place for current workers.

Putting aside defined pension plans and future unfunded pension obligations, one might want to examine 5:14 into the video where the union representative states “I’m a taxpayer too” when the discussion moves to taxpayers faced with funding pensions at the expense of core services. In other words, the taxpayers have to weigh the cost of providing pensions as they stand today at the expense of core services -or- realign pension funding in order to preserve core services. Note that the union representative immediately interrupts the discussion to point out that she too is a “taxpayer”.


Yes, she is a taxpayer.  However, upon further examination, she is exhibiting a classic public choice theory proposition regarding the taxpayer also acting as the taxpayer-recipient. "I'm a taxpayer too" comment exposes the proposition that the incremental cost to her [union rep] is rationally smaller than the summation of thousands of incremental tax increases, applied to the highly diffused taxpayers, which are then, the summation thereof, funneled back in a focused way to her benefit.


That is, the classic public choice theory example is: taxpayer A supports and campaigns for a tax increase of say $1 as rationally she understands the $1 incremental cost is to her - much, much smaller than the summation of incremental tax increases applied to the greater amount of taxpayers A-Z, of which, is then aggregated, then bestowed upon her [$1 tax increase to her is less than the benefit bestowed upon her].


Hence its rational for her to suppot, campaign for and happily pay the tax increase [tax increase required to fund a defined benefit plan and pay for core services] and its pure politics for her to make the claim that "I'm a taxpayer too" as she is making the implicit argument that she too is “a concerned taxpayer”. However, in effect she isn't really acting in the role of "taxpayer" she is really acting as the "recipient-of-the-taxpayer". She plays two roles: as taxpayer and recipient. Her taxpayer position less costly than her benefit in the recipient position.