Those Damn Rich

800 Companies, Groups Demand Repeal of Medical Device Tax

Starting January 1, medical-device makers must pay a new 2.3% excise tax on sales, regardless if they make a profit, to raise $30 billion over the next decade to pay for health reform.
FOX Business has obtained a letter sent this month to the Senate from executives at more than 800 companies and medical groups demanding the tax be repealed as part of the fiscal cliff deal.
Click here to read the letter
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) told FOX News that the 2.3% device tax should be part of the fiscal cliff deal, along with the health-reform law.
Already technology companies are announcing job cuts, reductions in R&D budgets and are canceling plans to build plants to pay for the tax. One study from trade association AdvaMed forecasts a huge 43,000 jobs lost due to the new tax. And it's the little guy who will get hit hardest, since many of the novel, cutting-edge medical technology innovations come from small companies with few employees.
The medical-device tax is among the nearly two dozen new or higher taxes in the Affordable Care Act that seek to raise tens of billions of dollars to pay for health reform. The medical-device tax has been roundly criticized as putting life-saving medical devices in the same tax category as alcohol or cigarettes.

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