Long Term Care Services and Support Trust Act Double Dipping with Taxation

The current Insurance Commission has stated that taking more of your hard earned money, via taxes, is a “good step” to helping residents of this great state to deal with the costs of long term care. The bill, known as the Long Term Care Services and Support Trust Act, requires increased payroll taxes on Washington residents, an average of $25 per month for a government controlled long term care insurance plan. The worst part, you cannot opt out even if you have private insurance. On top of this new tax, the same government recently increased taxes on the same healthcare providers that are essential to the long term care, so the government is receiving money from both sides. This will, in turn, drive the costs even higher and provide very little financial help to those who truly need it. In fact, it will increase their cost for long term care overall as all government subsidized programs do.

The establishment has long thought that taxing citizens is necessary to the greater good of the state. In reality, the greater good of the state is dependent on its citizens keeping their hard earned money in their pocket, and not in some government funded program that systematically does the exact opposite of what it is supposed to.

We need to address rising healthcare and insurance costs first and foremost by addressing how governments artificially make healthcare more expensive. Politicians often look for new ways to fix things without admitting their role in breaking it in the first place. We tax healthcare and insurance to the tune of billions of dollars in Washington. If elected to the office of insurance commissioner I will work tirelessly to reduce the cost of insurance and healthcare without mandating programs that many people would choose to opt out of, given the chance.

Anthony Welti

Candidate for insurance commissioner 2020