Response to Isolationism

In his blog post on U.S. foreign policy, Allen makes a good argument. The United States government must be very selective when it comes to intervening in the affairs of other countries, as such actions can have unfavorable results and cost this country a great deal. There is no quick or easy way out of the conflict in Iraq, for example, and we must be careful to avoid such situations in the future when there is no urgent need for them.

I agree that we should not try to change other countries' forms of government to something more favorable to us, by military or even financial means. These endeavors can lead to instability and violence, and do not necessarily have the intended outcome. Chilean president Salvador Allende, a socialist, was overthrown (after the U.S. government exerted an effort to create economic conditions favorable to a coup). As a result, Chile was taken over by Augusto Pinochet, under whose regime thousands were reportedly killed.

We cannot afford to go about dispensing help wherever there is a problem, particularly in light of our present financial troubles. However, there are sometimes circumstances that require us to get involved, whether militarily or financially. If there is a crisis that a country cannot deal with alone, the United States has a responsibility as a world power to provide aid.

Health Insurance Tax?

Health care reform is a high priority for the Obama administration. Many Americans cannot afford to pay for private health insurance, and major reform is needed to make coverage affordable for lower-income people. An important question, though, is how to pay for it - making health coverage available to nearly 50 million uninsured Americans is bound to be costly. One method advocated by some (though not by President Obama) is to allow the most expensive employer-supplied health benefits to be taxed as income.

Proponents of the idea argue that it would be an important source of the revenue necessary to pay for health care reform. One Congressional estimate puts the revenue that could come from the tax at $100 billion over five years, according to an article in the New York Times. A problem with the tax would be the difficulty in writing the legislation. It would have to be written carefully to avoid taxing lower-quality coverage that is expensive because of other factors (such as location or the size of the company paying the benefits) along with expensive, high-quality plans. Also, some analysts point out that if the group of taxable plans is too narrowly defined, the revenue gained will not be significant enough to warrant the action in the first place.

Even though the money for reform must come from somewhere, a tax on health insurance is not a good way to get it. Just because some employees' health benefits are expensive does not necessarily mean that they have income to spare. They must still pay costs associated with health insurance, and whatever the quality of their coverage they may still have difficulty paying their part. Taxing health benefits as income would put an undue burden on citizens struggling to get by.