Ex-IRS whistleblower says middle class targeted under inflation bill

Only MSNBCNN, right?

 

The 87K is not all agents, let alone armed agents, but includes a wide range of positions from IT to basic customer service, etc., as well as replacing 50,000+ staff due to retire in the next five years alone. Only Special Agents in the Criminal Investigation division are armed.

 

A good start.

 

What you are suggesting is both impossible-- for the government to control what our companies charge for their products, in other counties (thereby exceeding the scope, even, of suggestions from truly anti-Capitalist extremists, that our government should set wage and price controls, in this country)-- as well as utterly contradictory of your stated principle, that government should stay out of the way of business. To do as you stipulate, the government would be taking a giant leap, towards authoritarianism, making your post's closing line, especially ironic:
"Government doesn't negotiate it dictates."

In short, I am going to call "bullshit," once more, on your claim that you even would support such a proposal, which you no doubt realize never could, nor would, come to fruition.

 

Most of the premiums in Medicare Part D private insurance are paid by Medicare to subsidize the cost. At best, your monthly premiums are $0 if you meet the income thresholds and do not have certain life-threatening diseases such as certain types of cancer. At the worst, it is around $35 per month for premiums under Part D.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, prescription drug prices started skyrocketing and hit seniors hard who were on low, fixed income amounts. Medicare would only cover 80% of the drug costs in some cases, but not all, especially cancer drugs, insulin, etc. The popular idea at that time was for Medicare to negotiate drug prices directly. The Pharma industry didn't like that, and that is why the "compromise" by the GOP was Medicare Part D.

Part D does not cover doctor's visits. What you probably have is Part C and D combined in that policy as a supplement to Part B. The supplement insurance via Medicare can and does cover doctor's visits and so forth, along with a whole bunch of other things like regular insurance. But this is a "rider" that hitches on Part B coverage, which will be deducted from your SS Benefits each month.

 

Blues, GoodRx is a discount card. Nothing more, nothing less. And you have to choose between what your insurance pays or what GoodRX discounts the drug. Sometimes GoodRx is really good with some drugs, but sometimes it is not, like Novolog or Humulin Insulin which they discount 50% at the retail price of $325 per bottle. Insurance may provide you a max copay or other options that make the insurance the better choice, but you cannot use both. Other options include mail-in pharmacies, such as Caremark, if you are taking long-term medicine on a daily basis. But not insurance companies or Part D medicare offers that. The other issue is that some brand-name drugs have generics and they are just as effective as the brand name. GoodRx primarily discounts brand-name drugs and if there are generics, only your physician can make that happen when he writes the prescription. There is a box that says, "generic if available" that will be checked. So, it is not as simple as you make it, which is why Medicare negotiating drug prices as a price leader will help all. All you are doing is trying to find a way for you to save a few $$$$$$ and really do not care for anyone else.

You keep mentioning 9 medications costing you between $300 to $400, but that does not say much because only you know what the initial total retail price before insurance and GoodRx is.

 

GOODER AND HARDER: Surprise! Up to 90% of all new taxes in the Biden inflation bill could come from small businesses making less than $200k per year.



The War on Small Business continues... "80% of new IRS revenue will come from small businesses earning under $200K: tax experts "



"The IRS will have to target small and medium businesses because they won't fight back. We've seen this play out before … the IRS says ‘We're going after the rich' but when you're trying to raise that much money, the rich can only get you so far."

"In fact, going after the lower and middle class can actually be more lucrative for IRS auditors than trying to get more money from the wealthy. "The rich have their lawyers and fight it — that's why the poor are easier to go after'"



Lyin' Biden:

"Pres. Biden says new bill will have "the wealthy and big corporations finally begin to pay part of their fair share," adding "no one earning less than $400,000 a year will pay a penny more in federal taxes."'

They lie about everything, and it starts at the name of the bill. The "Reduce Inflation Act" that won't reduce inflation.

 

IF the government IS going to be involved I told you what I would support. That is make other countries pay the same prices we do. And we could apply export duties.

But those numbers spouted about don't usually include the actual cost the consumer pays here or overseas because insurance both private and government varies as do the taxes to support them. What we do find in other countries that refuse to pay the cost necessary is they have fewer options and fewer newer drugs because they end up having to wait until the generics come out in order to pay for them

Tell me do you think pharmaceutical companies, and the people who invest their money into them, will be willing to do so when they cannot seek a return commensurate with the risk or even lose money in order to supply medicines to the country and the world? We here bear a disproportionate share of the that and if government is going to get involved it should be to equalize those cost that other countries are subsidizing here.

Anyway back to the discussion on inflation I'll leave it with this from our National Library of Medicine that government price controls is not the end all be all and hasn't shown the price curbing and restraints hoped for. I prefer the free market which is incorporated into the Part D most Seniors have. Medicaid and the Veterans who pay for medicines directly already negotiate prices. The USA by far produces the most new and innovative pharmaceuticals and I prefer maintaining that robust industry, time for other countries to pay their fair share of that burden.

Have the last word........................

 

LOL, it's all to easy

 

Alwayssa why do you always feel you have to educate people on very basic matters of which they are fully aware and informed?

I know EXACTY what is GoodRx and it works VERY well and I have some of my prescriptions for which I use it. I know all about mail-in pharamcies and I CHOOSE to use a local pharmacy because of the service I receive and I can get a perscription same day, same hour if I need to. I have a CHOICE I am not at the mercy and discretion and dictate of the government. And my physician and I look at the web and compare cost between the name brand and generic and insurance or GoodRx, because there is a CHOICE. I have what I consider very reasonable pharmacy cost for what I get out of them. So don't take it upon yourself you need to educate me on such matters and just deal with the issues concering them.

 

No, you are wrong For starters you are not INCREASING staff by REPLACING retiree's.. With that out in the open and so far from the obvious I'll take the rest of your post with the same value

 

So the wealthy and the corporations should pay NOTHING while we "weak" people should pay it ALL. Thats better?

 

It's all lies. They never tax the rich effectively, and the rich politically support the folks that never tax them effectively. If you want to effectively tax the rich we need a flat sales tax. Everytime anyone spends money, their share of the national budget it deducted with each expenditure. Now matter who, no matter what.

The Federal government normally spends about 20% of GDP. So, when anyone spends on anything, a 20% tax is charged and transmitted to the government. You pay your taxes as you spend.

Our gross domestic product runs about $23T/year. If the government wants to spend an extra $T, say they want to get in a war, then everyone knows that if their representatives support this, it's going to cost each of us an additional 4.3% on our national sales tax. If our government sells some of the ridiculous amounts of property we own in the West, or we increase tariffs, or we have more oil, gas, coal, lease sales, or we dump part of the SPR, those would be reductions in our National Sales tax.



We all have as much government as we are willing to pay for. The last thing these guys want that are up to their armpits in graft is for us to have clarity. Those of us that make up the vast working and middle class need to continue to press for clarity and accountability. With clarity, we can see who is ripping us off and stop them.

 

From your posts, you didn't know what you are talking about. You think you do, but the reality is you do not know how things work, even on the basic scale. You keep stating you have private insurance for your Part D inferring that it is better because it is "private" and not government. But you never realize that the private insurance company is getting most of its subsidies for that very low-cost monthly premium on Part D because of the government. It may not be directly to you, but you still benefit from it. And yet, you are the anti-government political idealogue here, at least one of them.

Again, not knowing, and I really don't want to know, exactly what type of medications you are receiving, what their original retail cost is, and how much savings you get from insurance/GoodRx helps determine how good or not so good your plan actually is. But you don't do that. You are just throwing the final numbers out there thinking that solidifies your argument. It doesn't. It really does not do anything, which I have told you three times already.

Now, lets take a look at what "you would support" shall we?

For starters, if we allow our drugs to be exported, that would depend on the agreement we have with the host country, the exported drugs meeting the host country's standards, and likewise, they would allow exporting their drugs to us, assuming it meets our standards. If we do that, the only ones that would probably not agree are those same Pharma companies, like Eli Lily, Beyar, and other MNC Pharma companies. But what you cannot do is dictate prices. That would be negotiated between the Pharma and the host country if they can negotiate, or here, now with the new bill. However, when making this proposal, why in the life of you would you mention GoodRx to help with your argument? it really does not make sense.

 

Is there a reason you are posting what we all already know?

 

On what do you base that contention, which is central to your argument? Yet again, you are stating as a fact, something you have simply made up. The idea that drug companies do not sell their wares, at a decent profit, in other countries that won't pay the exorbitant prices we pay in the U.S., is nonsense. It is why we can, where the law allows it, import, with a price markup, the exact same drugs that are sold in the Canadian market, more cheaply than buying them through our own system!

Your argument about what the final cost of these are to consumers, when one weighs in both insurance costs and taxes used to support socialized medical systems, is completely apart from what price the drug maker gets, for its product. Where the government runs the system, it sets the cap on what it will pay for a particular drug. The manufacturer either takes it, or sells nothing at all in, and so makes zero profit from, that country. I contend that pharmaceutical companies, usually corporations, opt to make whatever profit they can, rather than none at all.

This is the more credible, or at least the less easily disprovable, argument you make: that America foots the bill, for the research, from which all the world benefits. One problem with that argument, is in the real world results, we see. This is the reason why a disproportionate amount of the research by drug companies goes into coming up with additional drugs, for problems that Americans are concerned with-- depression, acid reflux, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, psoriasis, & so forth (based on television advertising)-- and not for conditions which are more serious and afflict greater numbers of people, in the developing world (which is where your argument about waiting for generic versions of drugs, would hold water; but as soon as one must resort to comparing us to third world nations, to make an argument, IMO, that argument has been lost).


I actually found a report, from the CBO, on pharmaceutical R&D spending, which partially supports both of our positions.

https://www.cbo.gov/publication/57126

[SNIP]
In this report, the Congressional Budget Office assesses trends in spending for drug research and development (R&D) and the introduction of new drugs. CBO also examines factors that determine how much drug companies spend on R&D: expected global revenues from a new drug; cost to develop a new drug; and federal policies that affect the demand for drug therapies, the supply of new drugs, or both...
[End]

The report confirms that pharmaceutical R&D is up considerably, in recent years. Likewise, that its expected profits, worldwide, from any given drug, affect companies' research decisions. The report also notes an interesting difference between smaller companies, which do the lion's share of investing in the actual developing of new drugs, and the expenditures of larger corporations, which buy these drugs (and often the smaller companies, themselves), in their clinical trials, and shepherding the drugs through the process to FDA approval. However, the report further notes that there is evidence to suggest that big Pharmaceutical concerns buy smaller drug companies, not just to take their discoveries to market, but sometimes to prevent this from happening, when the drugs being developed, would compete with some profitable drug, already produced by that manufacturer.

[SNIP]

Trends in R&D Spending and New Drug Development

Private spending on pharmaceutical R&D and the approval of new drugs have both increased markedly in recent years, resuming a decades-long trend that was interrupted in 2008 as generic versions of some top-selling drugs became available and as the 2007–2009 recession occurred. In particular, spending on drug R&D increased by nearly 50 percent between 2015 and 2019. Many of the drugs approved in recent years are high-priced specialty drugs for relatively small numbers of potential patients. By contrast, the top-selling drugs of the 1990s were lower-cost drugs with large patient populations...

Although total R&D spending by all drug companies has trended upward, small and large firms generally focus on different R&D activities. Small companies not in PhRMA devote a greater share of their research to developing and testing new drugs, many of which are ultimately sold to larger firms (see Box 1). By contrast, a greater portion of the R&D spending of larger drug companies (including those in PhRMA) is devoted to conducting clinical trials, developing incremental “line extension” improvements (such as new dosages or delivery systems, or new combinations of two or more existing drugs), and conducting postapproval testing for safety-monitoring or marketing purposes...

Researchers have found some evidence that such acquisitions by larger drug firms are sometimes motivated by large firms’ desire to limit competition. According to a recent study of acquisitions in the pharmaceutical industry, for example, a company was about 5 percent to 7 percent less likely to complete the development of drugs in its acquired company’s pipeline if those drugs would compete with the acquirer’s existing drugs than it would be otherwise.(5 )In a 2017 study of competition and research and development (R&D), the Government Accountability Office cited several retrospective studies of mergers in the drug industry that found such transactions reduced R&D spending and patenting for several years.(6) The reverse was also true: Increases in pharmaceutical industry competition have been found to increase firms’ R&D spending.(7)...
[End]


But I am not the type who debates solely "to win," at the price of misrepresenting the truth, so I won't end my reply here. The report compares research dollars spent in 2009, versus 2019. Unfortunately, I am having no success copying its table, but it shows that the classes most heavily researched, in 2009, were mental health (anti-depressants), followed by oncologics (cancer drugs), then closely by pain, anti-hypertensives (blood pressure medicines), and GI products. Interestingly, these last three, plus mental health, especially, and viral hepatitis, are the five classes which had seen lower investment In 2019, than in '09 (so my impression had become slightly dated).

In 2019 however, cancer drug therapies led the pack, in Pharmaceutical industry research investment (which, with President Biden's commitment to support this, I would expect to continue). Next came diabetes (which is a more pronounced problem in the U.S., due to the American diet) and autoimmune disorders. With diabetes, the research (mostly in conducting trials) has been in developing new delivery systems, that is, insulin pumps. The last category, autoimmune, includes a wide array of disorders, some of which, like psoriasis, seem relatively speaking, a bit more superficial of a health concern, but which also includes rheumatoid arthritis. All of these top three, are areas with steeply increased research funding. A bit further back, in fourth place, we find "respiratory agents (which I assume concerns things like hay fever)." Right behind that, are HIV antivirals, though the report notes that the "new" drug treatments have focused on simply combining multiple already- proven drugs, in a single pill.

[SNIP]
Trends in Recent Drug Spending by Therapeutic Class. New or improved specialty drugs for diabetes, various cancers, autoimmune disorders (such as rheumatoid arthritis or multiple sclerosis), and HIV have propelled large retail-spending increases in the therapeutic classes for those illnesses (see Figure 4). Many of the new specialty drugs are biologics, based on living cell lines rather than chemical active ingredients. For HIV, the new antiretroviral therapies have been combinations of specialty drugs that simplify treatment
[End]

This is also a legitimate point, that the type of research today, into "biologics," is more expensive than earlier types of research.

[Snip]
Many of the drugs that have been approved in recent years are “specialty drugs.” Specialty drugs generally treat chronic, complex, or rare conditions, and they may also require special handling or monitoring of patients. Many specialty drugs are biologics (large-molecule drugs based on living cell lines), which are costly to develop, hard to imitate, and frequently have high prices. Previously, most drugs were small-molecule drugs based on chemical compounds. Even while they were under patent, those drugs had lower prices than recent specialty drugs have. Information about the kinds of drugs in current clinical trials indicates that much of the industry’s innovative activity is focused on specialty drugs that would provide new cancer therapies and treatments for nervous-system disorders, such as Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.
[End]

We shall see.

 

This is just an excuse to ignore the fact that the IRS is not in fact intending, as you claimed, to hire "80K armed agents" - a mistaken belief that calls into question your ability to know what to take at value.

Replacing retirees and resignations - 52K for the next six years alone, to be exact - is in fact part of the intended hires and will result in a net increase in the IRS workforce.

Additionally, when it comes to prospective retirees/resignations, "increasing" and "replacing" are not mutually exclusive. The ability to hire replacements has been severely hampered for decades by budget reductions and constraints. The resulting attrition means the IRS now has fewer employees than it did in the 1970s. The ability to replace them, as part of the IRS' recruitment plan, courtesy of the new budget, means that the workforce will increase relative to what would have done with continued restraints, rather than continue to shrink.

 

And, most importantly, simply disingenuous.

 

Come on now!! This is complete bs!! president biden has done everything in his power to unite this country, keep the illegals out, lower taxes, everything a person in his position could possibly do to support any and all tax payers of this country!! Complete bs!!

Oh wait, wrong President...

 

New analysis shows that more medicines worldwide are available to U.S. patients


https://catalyst.phrma.org/new-anal...ines-worldwide-are-available-to-u.s.-patients

Higher US branded drug prices and spending compared to other countries may stem partly from quick uptake of new drugs
"A contributor to higher US per capita drug spending is faster uptake of new and more expensive prescription drugs in the United States relative to other countries. In contrast, the other OECD countries employed mechanisms such as health technology assessment and restrictions on patients' eligibility for new prescription drugs, and they required strict evidence of the value of new drugs. "
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23569056/

Yep they won't sell them if the particular government refuses to pay them an adequate margin although they supply to poorer countries.

You do realize that this bill only applies to Medicare? And most on Medicare already have lower prices because thier private insurance and other discount sources including the ccompanies themselves discount prices. Along with the cap on out of pocket expense will only affect 1.2 million who pay over the $2000 cap.

We lead the world BY FAR in new drug degelopement and availability. I have no confidence government control will enhance andninprove that. Why do you think more government control over pricing will enhanced and improve that?

Again let's work on requiring other companies pay their commensurate share of those cost.

Now back to inflation.

 

Only certain people will drink that koolaid. You'll know who by those who agree with it.

 

Yeah, that's not what your SNIP says. It says that we spend more on drugs, because we are quicker to approve them, while other OECD countries wait until there is real evidence that the "new" drugs work. And if they offer no advantages over what is already available, why should anyone pay more for them?

 

Sounds like you gas lighted him....

 

Sounds like^ a hit doge holler?

 

Moving the goal post by changing the definition of a recession doesn't make it so!