Many of the healthcare reform bills under consideration include an individual mandate. If you don’t purchase health insurance you pay a fee. For the Senate Finance Committee and Senate Health Committee, this penalty would be up to $750. The House Version would assess the fee as 2.5 percent of adjusted gross income over a certain level ($18,700 for a couple). However, in all cases, individuals with religious objections would be exempt from these penalties from not purchasing insurance.
Will Obama’s healthcare reform efforts produce a religious revival? It’s doubtful, but the number of people who claim to have religious objections to avoid compliance with the individual mandate will rise.
Tags: Individual Mandate, Religion
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The exemption from the excise tax is for members of non-insurance ministries called health care sharing ministries. You can find out more about them here:
http://www.healthcaresharing.org.These are non-insurance charities that have over 100,000 members who are paying their own health care bills by sharing with one another. This innovative, affordable, faith-based approach is well loved by its members and we’re grateful that the Senate Finance committee included language so these 100,000+ folks have their religious liberty protected.
James Lansberry
President
Alliance of Health Care Sharing Ministries
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