That point seemed to be missing from an otherwise worthwhile discussion of the issue in the Post. This point is important to understanding its potential consequences. For example, if a plan just slipped over the $23,000 threshold, say to $23,500, then the tax would only apply to the $500 over the threshold. Applying the 40 percent tax rate, this implies a tax of $200, which is equal to 0.8 percent of the cost of the plan. It is unlikely that this would lead to major changes in policies. Over time, as costs continued to rise, there would be more pressure to keep the price of the plan down as the tax would have more consequence, but just crossing the tax threshold by a small amount is not a big deal.
--Dean Baker
