The very last time there was a law that several regarded as amnesty was initially in 2000. On December 21, 2000, President Clinton signed The Legal Immigration and Household Equity Act of 2000 (Existence Act) into law. This law, typically known as the Lifestyle Act or 245(i), permitted specific persons who had an immigrant visa immediately accessible but entered without having inspection (without having documents) or otherwise violated their status and thus are ineligible to apply for adjustment of status within the United States, to apply if they pay a $1,000 penalty.
"If a whole new amnesty law is passed that's the same because the outdated law, what will be the criteria?"
To be eligible under the previous amnesty law, you have to happen to be:
1. The named beneficiary of the Form I-130 immigrant visa petition ("Petition for Alien Relative"), or Form I-140 immigrant visa petition ("Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker"), or Form I-360 ["Petition for an Amerasian Widow(er), or Unique Immigrant], or Form I-526 ("Petition for an Alien Entrepreneur") or
2. The named beneficiary of an application for labor certification filed together with the Department of Labor (DOL) and
3. Been physically present within the United States in the course of a specific timeframe.
"Was there a due date for submitting under the outdated amnesty law?
Yes. You must have filed during a very quick window of chance. All petitions and applications needed to be effectively filed and approvable when filed.
"Was there a penalty or good for applying under the amnesty law?"
Yes. all of us who filed for https://www.usaimmigrationsupport.com/application-center/adjustment-of-status-form-i-485.html using Area 245(i) needed to pay a $1,000 penalty fee.
"Were there other unique specifications?"
On the list of primary needs was proving the applicant was physically present within the U.S. in the course of certain intervals of time. Therefore, in anticipation of the new amnesty law, you must gather documentation to demonstrate your physical presence in the U.S. Such documentation might include, but isn't restricted to, State driver's license; State identification card; hospital report; school transcript; Revenue tax records; home tax records; religious records; utility charges; rental receipts; bank statements; employment records; and so on.
"Can I travel outside the us?"
If you are while in the nation without having documentation or otherwise out of status, travelling out of the us will set off an unlawful presence bar which might probably result in denial of any long term https://www.usaimmigrationsupport.com/ application. Under current law, anyone who has been while in the U.S. illegally for a year or even more and then leaves, is barred from returning for 10 years.
Article Source:
http://www.articlecity.com/articles/politics_and_government/article_942.shtml
Source:
http://www.financebusinessarticles.com
Break out the coffee enema on the Statue of Liberty. Or better yet, sick it on Jim Cramer. The US economic system is backed up and there's only one way out.a massive detox that is going to result in the biggest flush heard around the world.
US Economy is a Disaster
Like any good detox, people are going to feel worse before they get better. This is no different with the current state of the US economy. There will be a lot of pain, a lot of finger pointing (can I suggest a direction, that may possibly dislodge the problem?), and a lot of excuses from the banksters, mortgage brokers, politicians, and the like.
However, when you deal with toxicity the best thing is to acknowledge it, take steps to rectify it (LOL), and prepare for some pain and discomfort. During and after the process you need to supply your body with powerful foods and herbs that can cleanse your body's systems so that it can regenerate properly again.
The US economy is no different.
The government needs to stop incurring toxic debt and has to stop ignoring the root cause of the problem. The system needs a serious cleanse, but they refuse to take the healthiest route. It's almost like they are in cahoots with the FDA (ahem) and they operate on the same premise - keep the public on their happy pills, declare martial law on anyone who tries to question or buck the system, and refuse to offer any real lasting solutions that keeps the public's monetary and physical health intact.
That's because it's not profitable for them to do so. They can't resist the monetary orgy, and having their front shirt pockets and bra's being filled with newly printed bills (or perhaps certificates for a stake in Fort Knox).
Uncle Scam indeed.
One palpable trait of a toxic government is the denial to see the truth, or acknowledge it. Like a new guest at AA, its either everyone else's problem or something you inherited. Either route will NOT result in a detox, which will not result in true health in any realm.
So what are the politicians doing? Blaming everyone else and employing complete denial.
"We've always been and always will be a AAA country," says Obama recently (referring to their credit "score" downgrade from AAA to AA+). Mark those words on his political tombstone.
Back in April, two days after S&P warned they were considering a downgrade on the US credit rating, Tim Geithner was asked what he thought of S&P's chances of going through with it. "No risk of that, no risk," was his reply.
Whoops. There's that denial again.
America's biggest cheerleader, Warren Buffet, feels the US economy deserves an AAAA rating, as it can print money at will. Inflation, well, that's another issue. So now we have denial disguised in a lie. If default were the only route to a downgrade, the US economy would never have to worry and could keep its AAA rating. However, hyperinflation (which results from "printing money at will") will surely result in a downgrade as much as a default, and that's exactly where the US is headed (along with everyone else). It's just going to take a while longer.
Then we have a bunch or "world savers" who were feverishly working on a budget that would keep the debt ceiling from being smashed through - again. However, the new deal didn't result in any "cleaning".
Consider the following example, which compares the debt ceiling deal to a household budget:
Total annual income: $21,700?Amount of money the family spent: $38,200?Amount of new debt added to the credit card: $16,500?Outstanding balance on the credit card: $142,710?Amount cut from the budget: $385
How long do you believe this family will remain solvent?
The bigger problem is that Uncle Sam is part of everyone's family, and his debt is ultimately your debt, and your children's debt. How do you feel about your Uncle now?
Unfortunately, the good times always have to come to an end and the consequences are equal to the debauchery that preceded it. That party is just beginning to wind down. I suggest you sober up quickly, do your own cleanse, and build up your "minerals" to safeguard your own particular situation. Just because the US economy is going to do a detox, doesn't mean you have to join in.
So quaff back that last beer, and sober up, before the political hooligans do, and avoid the unnecessary hangover.
Source:
http://www.financebusinessarticles.com
"UN figures indicate that the world economy is poised for recovery, but for Africa to benefit the continent must focus on industrialization as a critical engine of economic growth and development," Ban said in his message to mark the Africa Industrialization Day, observed annually on Nov. 20 and whose theme this year is "Industrialization for integration."
Armed conflict, inadequate infrastructure, weak governance, limited financing and technological abilities, and policies that stifle entrepreneurship, limit competition and raise the cost of doing business are hindering the industrialization that Africa needs to fully join the global economy, he said.
"Efforts to address these challenges must be rooted in a shared global responsibility for our planet's prosperity," he said.
"We know what is needed, including a green agricultural revolution linked to industrial transformation. Indeed, there is great industrial potential in the emergence of a new, green economic paradigm," he said.
African leaders must provide a supportive regulatory and financial framework for such changes to gain strength, he noted.
Meanwhile, the international community must work with African governments and institutions to do the research, make the investments and deploy the technologies for a climate-resilient, low-carbon growth path to feed Africa's growing population and raise living standards by building the industries of the future, he said.
Ban cited encouraging economic growth on the continent in the past few years but stressed that increased industrialization is necessary if the transformation of African economies is to be sustained.
"Industrialization will help Africa increase its share of global output and trade, and become more fully and meaningfully a part of the global economy," he said. "But integration itself will help Africa industrialize, since African economies need improved access to global markets if its industries are to be competitive."
"Greater integration of regional markets on the continent itself can also foster industrial development by making it easier to produce at economic scale," he said.
http://www.financebusinessarticles.com
Before we try to understand why the Washington political class is so clueless about the gathering budget and debt storm clouds that are fast approaching, it might be a good idea to review the latest estimates from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) relative to the country's financial shape, estimates that are very scary:
- Within a few months, our national debt will have escalated to $14 TRILLION or the equivalent of $121,739 per United States household.
- At an average household income of about $60,000 a year (pre-tax), each American household would have to go without food, shelter, clothes, or anything else for over two years to pay off their portion of the national debt as it stands now.
- If the government and the political class that runs it do not change their spending habits immediately, another $7 TRILLION will be added to the nation's debt over the next ten years. At that time, $21 TRILLION in debt will come out to about $136,000 a year per household if you assume the number of households grows at a rather robust 3% a year.
- However, to hit that $7 TRILLION number, the political class would have to allow all of the newly renewed tax cuts to expire in two years, they would not make any further adjustments to the Alternative Minimum Tax snafu and they would have to actually implement the draconian Medicare cuts they are supposed to do. These three steps are probably unlikely, given the spineless nature of our politicians, which means that it is not an additional $7 TRILLION but a more realistic $13.6 TRILLION. This would put the overall debt at almost $28 TRILLION and the equivalent household responsibility at $179,000.
- The CBO report goes on to estimate that interest on that debt over the next ten years would be around $5.4 TRILLION. Since the Obama administration has proposed cutting spending by only $478 billion over ten years and the Republicans have targeted $2.5 TRILLION in budget cuts, neither party's half hearted efforts at fiscal restraint will come close to just paying off the interest on our debt. In this reality, the United States will never pay off its ever increasing debt load. This is like someone's personal finances who constantly spend 70% more than what they earn and who only pays off a fraction of that 70% amount every month. The simple math will eventually crush them.
- By the year 2021, the CBO estimates that the country would be paying more than a TRILLION a year just in interest payments on the debt. For comparison purposes, understand that today the Federal government collects only a little more than $2 TRILLION a year in revenue. Thus, by 2021, about half of what we would pay in taxes today would be solely for interest payments.
- In 2011, given the newly estimated and higher 2011 deficit, the annual deficit will be equal to about 9.8% of the country's GDP, about a percentage point higher than it was in 2010 and almost as bad as the 10% incurred in 2009. That 10% was the highest deficit to GDP ratio in 65 years. The general consensus is that a country's deficit number should be no more than 3% of its GDP and in 2011 the United States will exceed that threshold maximum by three fold.
- According to the CBO report, mandatory government spending (which I am assuming is Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security) will rise an average of 5.6% a year for the next ten years. Since the U.S. economy rarely grows more than 3-4% a year, in good times, unless changes are made to the mandatory spending levels, more and more taxes will have to be collected to make up the shortfall. More and more taxes going to the government means less and less spending on growing the economy which reduces the tax stream which requires higher taxes, etc., etc. Its called a death spiral.
- Although not in the CBO report, a Fortune magaizine article last summer estimated the total wealth, not income, of the four hundred richest Americans. If you add up that wealth you see that these 400 Americans control about $2.7 TRILLION of wealth. Theoretically, if the government was to confiscate everything these Americans owned, sold it and applied what they received to the almost $28 TRILLION national debt we will have in about ten years, the rest of America would still owe our debtors about $25 TRILLION. The lesson: you cannot solve this impending disaster by taxing the rich more since even if you took everything they owned, it would reduce the national debt by less than 10%.
A lot of numbers but the message is so clear: we are about to do a Thelma and Louise off of the financial cliff and the Democrats are steering the car and the Republicans are not working the breaks. But this does not have to be the case. Consider what some other, smarter Americans are doing relative to the ballooning national debt:
- The CATO Institute is going through the last Federal budget, line by line, program by program, and identifying ways to cut and save taxpayer money. I will go into their findings in detail in the near future but they are easily finding hundreds of billions of dollars in either wasteful, useless, or redundant government operations that need to be terminated immediately.
- The President instituted his own Deficit Reduction Commission to look into ways to curb Federal spending and get the debt under control. As predicted, he gave it no support from start to finish and despite the excellent bipartisan recommendations they came up with, Obama, Pelosi, and Reid effectively neutered any action before it even got started. I feel sorry for those that worked and succeeded in implementing the charter of the commission, the political class never wanted them to succeed in the first place.
- Nicole Tichon of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, (liberal leaning) and Andrew Moylan of the National Taxpayers Union (conservative leaning) developed and reported on a joint analysis of government spending entitled, "Toward Common Ground: Bridging The Political Divide To Reduce Spending." They also easily found hundreds of billions of dollars a year that could be cut out of the Federal budget with minimal impact on most Americans, projects that they list (much like the CATO analysis) in their report. Many of these savings are not just straight budget cuts but straight forward, logical cost efficiencies that our political class should have been pursuing for decades. If you look at their list of cuts, the average American would have not problems with their recommendations since they are unaffected by the wasteful spending.
- The Bipartisan Policy Center, which is headed by former Democratic and Republican majority leaders, has been meeting on a regular basis in Washington to also come up with an approach to saving the country from its debt. The members on the panel addressing the issue within the Center include both Republicans and Democrats, most have extensive government budgeting experience, and they are addressing EVERY government expenditure including Social Security and Medicare.
- The Concord Coalition is headed up by an ex-Republican Senator, Warren Rudman, and an ex-Democratic Senator, Bob Kerry, and they and their coalition have also done extensive work in examining ways to reducing our out of control spending.
- In an AP/NBC poll that was reviewed in The Week magazine issue from December 10, 2010, the results showed that Americans favored government spending cuts over tax increases by a two to one margin.
So let's review. The country is heading for insolvency by just about any way you measure reality. Republicans and Democrats, progressive think tanks and conservative think tanks, sometimes working together, have come up with drastic, viable and necessary approaches to avoiding sovereign insolvency. Ordinary Americans have voted do cut unnecessary government expenses via the AP pol, and in the November elections when dozens of Tea Party endorsed candidates were elected to curb spending.
It appears that the only people in the country that have not gotten the message are the long term, established political careerists in Washington. Their cuts, regardless of who is recommending them are minuscule compared to the overall budget. They sabotage their own deficit reduction commissions. The take the Bush tax cut debate issue, which revolved around whether or not to receive an additional $70 billion a year in taxes from the richest Americans and they manage to turn that into a one year additional deficit of over $400 billion, according to the CBO. Unbelievable.
If everyone else in the country sees the problem, why don't our politicians? Probably because they are afraid to take an unpopular stand since it might cost them some votes in their re-election campaign even though their lack of courage is killing the financial viability of the nation. Very, very selfish and short term thinking.
The only other possible reason for their inaction and sabotage of reduction efforts is that they truly do not understand the basics of government finances. In either case, selfishness or ignorance, we are in for a Thelma and Louise ending unless changes are made.
The following steps might be a got start to getting our fiscal house in order in Washington:
- Step 1 - reduce government spending by 10% a year for five years using the spending reduction road maps that many of the above efforts have come up with.
- Step 2 - increase law enforcement efforts to crack down and eliminate fraud and criminal activity that robs the government of untold billions of dollars every year.
- Step 3 - bring back almost all of the deployed U.S. troops around the world who are stationed to fight potential conflicts that no longer exist (e.g. why does the U.S. still have over 50,000 troops stationed in Germany?). We no longer can afford to garrison the world with our troops.
- Step 4 - hold Congressional committee members accountable for their areas of responsibility and remove them from those Committee post for dereliction of duty. If this rule was in effect, committees with Medicare oversight responsibilities would be re-staffed, given that Medicare loses almost $100 billion a year through fraud and criminal activity.
- Step 5 - require all politicians to take and pass a course in basic economic theory so that they have at least a fighting chance of understanding how their excessive spending could destroy the country.
- Step 6 - the most important step, impose strict term limits on politicians in office. If you have no chance of getting re-elected as a politician, then selling your soul for a few votes is no longer an option, freeing you up to make the hard decisions for the benefit of America. Janis Joplin once sang that "freedom is just another word for nothing else to lose." If you have nothing else to lose, i.e. you cannot get re-elected due to term limits, you now have the freedom to vote on what is best for the nation.
Americans have to understand that nothing else matters if the country goes bankrupt. Gay rights, education, clean energy, high speed rail, retirement funding, national security, police and fire protection, immigration reform, energy policy, medical costs and care, freedom, gun control, any issue that is important to you goes out the window if the economy collapses. Because if that happens you are left with only two choices: anarchy or martial law, neither of which would be pleasant and leave you living in a free, safe, and vibrant society. The only solution is to take our sour tasting, vomit inducing financial medicine by reducing spending on EVERY service the government provides, doing it in the least painful way possible, but understanding it will be painful.
CATO gets it, the Public Interest Research Group gets it, the National Taxpayer Foundation gets it, Obama's Deficit Reduction Commission gets it, the bipartisan Policy Center gets it, and those Americans that got polled by AP/NBC and voted for tea Party candidates get it, why don't the politicians get it? Oh, that's right. They are already making plans for the 2012 elections. Two years away and they are already more concerned about getting re-elected in 2012 then saving the country. Shameful.
Article Source:
http://www.articlecity.com/articles/politics_and_government/article_916.shtml
In truth, most people that reside in the places called ghettos are involved in inner & outer conflict. The struggles to attain happiness are conflicted in many ways, but the goals are always for prosperity, unified joy, and harmony. These expressions are expressed in the committed arts from the people in the condition. Therefore, the dynamics explaining the people & many solutions are also expressed. Styles of music have expressed problems in the past, but only one art form seems to express problems and solutions through the variations of styles within it. The easiest way to understand those themes and places of living seems to come from hip-hop music. In the 1st volume of this book I briefly mentioned an organization called "The Temple of Hip-Hop", and the principles created from it. These principles fully apply in dynamic forms for the understanding of most of humanity. I will try to explain why and how.
A ghetto is an area where people from a specific ethnic or religious background are united in a given low condition area, voluntarily or involuntarily, for mild or strict seclusion. .The term now commonly labels any poverty-stricken urban area. The U.S. mobile home parks, farm labor housing, and Indian reservations indicate the poorest areas in the U.S. In the United States, urban neighborhoods where Latino immigrants settled in the late 20th century called barrios, are ghettos, because most immigrants form a culturally isolated society and choose to remain there or associate with their own group as a part of cultural preservation. "Ghetto" is also used figuratively to indicate geographic areas with a concentration of any type of persons suffering from poverty. The term is also used to describe an item or an action as cheap or flimsy. Some consider this use of language to be an offensive misapplication.
As perfectly exemplified by the artist known as "Ice Cube"- in the music video "Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It", those called the poor minorities, and those that are "true life expressing artists" are often scapegoated/ blamed for the problems designed by the oppressive elements of the society. No current music art has as equal amout of social motivation and/or awareness expression impacts around the world as Hip Hop. This is partially also due to the positive contributions of artists named KRS-One, Eric B.& Rakim, Public Enemy, Jay-Z, Wyclef Jean, Goodie Mob, Queen Latifah, and others.Art tends to be the strongest motivational force among all of humanity for awareness of local to international ills, and creative stimulation to solve personal and social problems.
Many people in the U.S. and Europe strongly dislike the term ghetto, believing it to have racist, elitist and culturally insensitive overtones, and the mention of such a word to describe a working-class ethnic community is considered a generalization or an insult. Many social workers and community leaders suggest alternative words to describe these areas like economically disadvantaged areas. Post-colonial places that did succumb to white supremacy influences, have been disrupted from their pre-colonial advanced societies to enhanced disorganization, low or disallowed self-sustenance, and poor trade practices, now called underdeveloped. This has also happened in Europe and western Asia.This is called the third world and marked by a number of common traits; distorted and highly dependent economies devoted to producing primary products for the developed world and to provide markets for their finished goods; traditional, rural social structures; high population growth; and widespread poverty. Nevertheless, the third world is sharply differentiated, for it includes countries on various levels of economic development. And despite the poverty of the countryside and the urban shantytowns, the ruling elites of most third world countries are wealthy.
This combination of conditions in Asia, Africa, Oceania and Latin America are linked to the absorption of the third world into the international capitalist economy, by way of conquest or indirect domination. The main economic consequence of having domination-based culture(s) in control of a world market is that they perpetuate dominance to there new generations via religious doctrine and education, and make the victims believe in a servitude and/or recessive place in society. By setting up throughout the third world sub-economies linked to the West, and by introducing other modern institutions, industrial capitalism disrupted traditional economies and, indeed, societies. This disruption led to the current status of regional underdevelopment common worldwide. This is also very well displayed in the music video by a group called "The Geto Boy's" – called "The World is a Ghetto".
Even after decolonization (in the 1950's, 1960's, and 1970's, the economies of the third world developed slowly, or not at all, owing largely to the deterioration of the "terms of trade"-the relation between the cost of the goods a nation must import from abroad and its income from the exports it sends to foreign countries. Terms of trade are said to deteriorate when the cost of imports rises faster than income from exports. Since buyers in the industrialized countries determined the prices of most products involved in international trade, the worsening position of the third world was scarcely surprising. Only the oil-producing countries (after 1973) succeeded in escaping the effects of Western, domination of the world economy.
No study of the third world could hope to assess its future prospects without taking into account population growth. In 1980, the earth's population was estimated at 4.4 billion, 72 percent of it in the third world, and it seemed likely to reach 6.2 billion, 80 percent of it in the third world, at the close of the century. These countries are also known as the Global South, developing countries, and least developed countries in academic circles. Development workers also call them the two-thirds world and The South. Some dislike the term developing countries as it implies that industrialization is the only way forward, while they believe it is not necessarily the most beneficial. Many "third world" countries are located in all but one continent, Antarctica.
They are often nations that were colonized by another nation in the past. The populations of third world countries are generally very poor but with high birth rates. In general they are not as industrialized or technologically advanced as the first world. The majority of the countries in the world fit this classification, but the bad thing is that the people in them are developed to become ashamed of what is usually their version of a safer way of living, whether it be an incomplete conception by the natives, or mis-interpreted by outsiders. We can always improve!
Article Source:
http://www.articlecity.com/articles/politics_and_government/article_919.shtml
The Affordable Care Act was signed into law on March 23, 2010 by President Obama. It is primarily health insurance reform legislation. The passage of this legislation was highly controversial. Most Democrats supported the legislation and most Republicans opposed it. Politicians, countless media spin doctors, healthcare industry participants and lobbyists shouted their opinions about the legislation both before it was passed and continue to do so afterward.
In reality, while the healthcare law is not perfect, it does address many issues that have needed to be addressed for decades. There are some aspects of the law that can and should be improved on and there also are many healthcare issues that still need to be addressed, especially dealing further with the quality and cost of healthcare.
Most people have an opinion about the new healthcare law and many strongly support or oppose it, yet few people have any idea about what the law includes and why they really should be in favor of or against the law. It is time for Americans to stop listening to the talking points of the politicians and self-appointed media pundits and the spin and misinformation they are spewing.
Healthcare now represents over 17% of the American GNP and it is increasing every year. Hundreds of thousands of people work in insurance companies dealing with healthcare, yet not one of them actually provides healthcare. Countless others in hospitals and doctors' offices are handling paperwork using paper processes that have barely changed in the last fifty years. We have the best healthcare in the world for those that can afford it, yet millions of Americans get little or no healthcare. Americans spend billions of dollars every year on diet plans, yet the average weight of Americans increases every year, resulting in epidemic levels of diabetes, coronary and other diseases and medical conditions, resulting in escalating healthcare costs. Medication developed and manufactured by American pharmaceutical companies is priced significantly higher in the U.S. than in other countries.
Medical errors made by doctors, nurses and other medical professionals are one of the leading causes of death and injury in the U.S. every year. In many cases, best practices are established but not followed. Malpractice insurance costs are too high, yet if your family member suffers injury or death due to medical errors, are you ready to have a law capping your ability to take legal action? Americans can buy almost anything across state lines, but not health insurance. Millions of unmarried heterosexual couples cannot include their partner in their health insurance plan. Countless families have been wiped out financially due to serious illnesses either not covered or insufficiently covered by medical insurance, or because they could not get health insurance.
The Affordable Healthcare Act addresses some of these and other problems, yet there is much the law does not address, or that is inadequately addresses. Congress still has much to do regarding healthcare. Are they up to the challenge?
In employee satisfaction surveys and employee opinion surveys employees are asked their opinions about and satisfaction with employee benefits they receive from their employer. Most employees across many industries are saying their health insurance costs are escalating much too quickly while their coverage is being cut back. For many employers and their employees, annual increases in health insurance costs have averaged 15% - 25% and more over the last few years due to actual increases in medical costs as well as insurance companies increasing premiums in anticipation of the healthcare legislation.
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office says the new law will actually lower healthcare costs over time. Many people agree with them and many others disagree. The majority of people have formed their opinions with little or no knowledge of the healthcare legislation.
Following are the key provisions of the Affordable Healthcare Act. This is information Americans should know about so that they can make their own, informed decisions about the healthcare legislation and what needs to be done going forward.
Effective as of January 1, 2011
- Insurers are prohibited from excluding pre-existing medical conditions (except in grandfathered individual health insurance plans) for children under the age of 19.
- Insurers are prohibited from dropping policyholders when they get sick.
- Insurance companies are prohibited from imposing lifetime dollar limits on essential benefits, like hospital stays in new policies issued.
- Insurers are required to reveal details about administrative and executive expenditures.
- Insurers are required to implement an appeals process for coverage determination and claims on all new plans.
- Dependents (children) will be permitted to remain on their parents' insurance plan until their 26th birthday, and regulations implemented under the Act include dependents that no longer live with their parents, are not a dependent on a parent's tax return, are no longer a student, or are married.
- Insurers are prohibited from charging co-payments or deductibles for Level A or Level B preventive care and medical screenings on all new insurance plans.
- Individuals affected by the Medicare Part D coverage gap will receive a $250 rebate, and 50% of the gap will be eliminated in 2011. The gap will be eliminated by 2020.
- Insurers' abilities to enforce annual spending caps will be restricted, and completely prohibited by 2014.
- Adults with pre-existing conditions will be eligible to join a temporary high-risk pool, which will be superseded by the health care exchange in 2014. To qualify for coverage, applicants must have a pre-existing health condition and have been uninsured for at least the past six months. There is no age requirement. The new program sets premiums as if for a standard population and not for a population with a higher health risk. Premiums are allowed to vary by age, geographic area, and family composition. Out-of-pocket spending is limited to $5,950 for individuals and $11,900 for families, excluding premiums.
- The Medicaid drug rebate for brand name drugs is increased to 23.1% (except the rebate for clotting factors and drugs approved exclusively for pediatric use increases to 17.1%), and the rebate is extended to Medicaid managed care plans; the Medicaid rebate for non-innovator, multiple source drugs is increased to 13% of average manufacturer price.
- A non-profit Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute is established, independent from government, to undertake comparative effectiveness research. This is charged with examining the "relative health outcomes, clinical effectiveness, and appropriateness" of different medical treatments by evaluating existing studies and conducting its own.
- Creation of task forces on Preventive Services and Community Preventive Services to develop, update, and disseminate evidenced-based recommendations on the use of clinical and community prevention services.
- The FDA is authorized to approve generic versions of biologic drugs and grant biologics manufacturers 12 years of exclusive use before generics can be developed.
- The Indian Health Care Improvement Act is reauthorized and amended.
- The President will establish within the Department of Health and Human Services a council to be known as the National Prevention, Health Promotion and Public Health Council to help begin to develop a National Prevention and Health Promotion Strategy. The Surgeon General shall serve as the Chairperson of the new Council.
- Indoor tanning services are subjected to a 10% service tax.
- Enhanced methods of fraud detection are implemented.
- Medicare is expanded to small, rural hospitals and facilities.
- Medicare patients with chronic illnesses must be monitored/evaluated on a 3 month basis for coverage of the medications for treatment of such illnesses.
- Non-profit Blue Cross insurers are required to maintain a loss ratio (money spent on procedures over money incoming) of 85% or higher to take advantage of IRS tax benefits.
- Companies which provide early retiree benefits for individuals aged 55–64 are eligible to participate in a temporary program which reduces premium costs.
- A new website installed by the Secretary of Health and Human Services will provide consumer insurance information for individuals and small businesses in all states.
- A temporary credit program is established to encourage private investment in new therapies for disease treatment and prevention.
- Insurers will be required to spend 85% of large-group and 80% of small-group and individual plan premiums (with certain adjustments) on health care or to improve health-care quality, or return the difference to the customer as a rebate.
- The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is responsible for developing the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation and overseeing the testing of innovative payment and delivery models.
- Flexible spending accounts, healthcare reimbursement arrangements and health savings accounts cannot be used to pay for over the counter drugs, purchased without a prescription, except for insulin.
Effective by January 1, 2012
- Employers must disclose the value of the benefits they provided beginning in 2012 for each employee's health insurance coverage on the employees' annual Form W-2's.
- New tax reporting changes come into effect which aims to prevent tax evasion by corporations and individuals.
Effective by January 1, 2013
- Self-employment and wages of individuals above $200,000 annually (or of families above $250,000 annually) will be subject to an additional tax of 0.5%.
Effective by January 1, 2014
- Insurers are prohibited from discriminating against or charging higher rates for any individuals based on pre-existing medical conditions.
- Impose an annual penalty of $95, or up to 1% of income, whichever is greater, on individuals who do not secure insurance; this will rise to $695, or 2.5% of income, by 2016. This is an individual limit; families have a limit of $2,085. Exemptions to the fine in cases of financial hardship or religious beliefs are permitted.
- Insurers are prohibited from establishing annual spending caps.
- Expand Medicaid eligibility; individuals with income up to 133% of the poverty line qualify for coverage, including adults without dependent children.
- Two years of tax credits will be offered to qualified small businesses. In order to receive the full benefit of a 50% premium subsidy, the small business must have an average payroll per full time equivalent ("FTE") employee, excluding the owner of the business, of less than $25,000 and have fewer than 11 FTEs. The subsidy is reduced by 6.7% per additional employee and 4% per additional $1,000 of average compensation. A 16 FTE firm with a $35,000 average salary would be entitled to a 10% premium subsidy.
- Impose a $2000 per employee tax penalty on employers with more than 50 employees who do not offer health insurance to their full-time workers (as amended by the reconciliation bill).
- Set a maximum of $2000 annual deductible for a plan covering a single individual or $4000 annual deductible for any other plan (see 111HR3590ENR, section 1302). These limits can be increased under rules set in section 1302.
- Creation of a new voluntary long-term care insurance program; enrollees who have paid premiums into the program and become eligible (due to disability or chronic illnesses) would receive benefits that help pay for assistance in the home or in a facility.
- Employed individuals who pay more than 9.5% of their income on health insurance premiums will be permitted to purchase insurance policies from a state-controlled health insurance option. If the employer provides an employer sponsored plan but the individual earns less than 400 per cent of the Federal Poverty level and could qualify for a government subsidy, the employee is entitled to obtain a "free choice voucher" from the employer of equivalent value to the employer's offering which can be spent in the exchange to buy a subsidized policy of his own choosing.
- Pay for new spending, in part, through spending and coverage cuts in Medicare Advantage, slowing the growth of Medicare provider payments (in part through the creation of a new Independent Payment Advisory Board), reducing Medicare and Medicaid drug reimbursement rate, cutting other Medicare and Medicaid spending.
- Revenue increases from a new $2,500 limit on tax-free contributions to flexible spending accounts (FSAs), which allow for payment of health costs.
- Chain restaurants and food vendors with 20 or more locations are required to display the caloric content of their foods on menus, drive-through menus, and vending machines. Additional information, such as saturated fat, carbohydrate, and sodium content, must also be made available upon request.
- Establish health insurance exchanges, and subsidization of insurance premiums for individuals with income up to 400% of the poverty line, as well as single adults. The subsidy will be provided as an advanceable, refundable tax credit. Refundable tax credit is a way to provide government benefit to people even with no tax liability.
Article Source:
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