Archive for September 9th, 2009

Up to $3,800 fine for fail­ure get health insurance

September 9th, 2009

WASHINGTON – A top sen­a­tor is call­ing for fines of up to $3,800 on fam­i­lies who fail to get med­ical insur­ance after a health care over­haul goes into effect.
The plan from Demo­c­ra­tic Sen. Max Bau­cus of Mon­tana would make health insur­ance manda­tory, just like auto cov­er­age. It would pro­vide tax cred­its to help cover the cost for peo­ple mak­ing up to three times the fed­eral poverty level. That’s about $66,000 for a fam­ily of four, and $32,000 for an indi­vid­ual.
But those who still don’t sign up would face hefty fines, start­ing at $750 a year for indi­vid­u­als and $1,500 for fam­i­lies. The max­i­mum penalty on indi­vid­u­als would be $950.