Taxing Grandma's Wheelchair - Making Money off the Sick and Disabled?  

It seems to me that all these bills have one thing in common - they all want to provide medical insurance to anyone who is healthy and make sure that anyone who actually needs care gets rationed, taxed or pretty much set to the side. Taxing life-saving devices is just one way to make sure that people who need care will get penalized even more.

I forgot we hate fat people... sorry. You know I can think of some 40 year olds who needed knee replacements, but they were professional athletes. Destroying your knees playing hockey or football is a lifestyle choice too.

I am not really sure how manufacturing these items makes anyone sicker or how the makers of durable medical equipment can actually make you sicker. If it were not for the development and manufacture of many of these devices, a lot more people would be a lot more disabled and many would not be alive at all. I don't understand the kind of logic that turns those who develop life-saving devices into devious schemers trying to make people ill. If people hadn't needed these devices before, no one would have bothered to invent them. I suppose the guys who invented the artificial heart were in cahoots with Ronald McDonald. (Yeah, Ronald, you get them to eat the Big Macs, we'll then sell them this artificial heart when their coronary arteries clog up).

As a person whose disability is related to neither weight nor old age, but rather a degenerative, progressive, neurological disorder, I wouldn't mind being able to afford a nice power scooter. Unfortunately, I don't have any health insurance since I became disabled from working.

Just want to mention those facts and then state that I am not in favor of any of the health care reform bills presented thus far. I don't want something for nothing badly enough to put the future of my country at risk.

Oh yeah, forgot... those that worked all their lives and were forced to pay into this system on the promise that it would provide them with certain benefits upon retirement have just taken that promise a little bit too far and outlived their usefulness.

Wow, that's some attitude. You should do well in the new regime. Until, that is, you become a useless eater too.

After I came out of the nursing home I need a special chair for which I paid $1,700.00 plus tax and medicare paid a mere stipened. So I'm glad "I cant see U"
as you do not know what you are talking about!

It's funny, whiteheather, but most people don't seem to be too upset about the government wanting to tax necessary medical equipment. A lot of responses have been about how useless those who need them are. But age and disability is not something they should feel safe from. One can strike at any time and the other is always creeping up behind you. I am disheartened at the disgust these people seem to have for the elderly and disabled.

Rollo please see my comment above. I am not going to read any more responses as you have infiltrated by Bamaloonies!

Let them jabber on, whiteheather. They show themselves for what they really are. I wish I could say that it destroys my faith in humanity, but I lost that a long time ago.

What really gets me is people like the idiot above (UCantSeeMe) and his response is that he is only 34 years of age and I have been paying my Medicare Taxes for longer than he has been alive!!! I made a larger salary (higher taxes) than he could ever hope to achieve. So now I truly hope he will not have Mediacre to help him if he ever needs it.

Who estimated that less than 20% of people who have them really need them? If Medicare is paying out big bucks for unnecessary equipment, then the problem is that a government run health system is pretty susceptible to fraud and waste. In fact, Obama told us that Medicare has enough fraud and waste to pay for the whole health care reform. Why not clean up the fraud in the system rather than tax people on the fraudulent pay outs? The government should say, okay, we're going to cover this device you don't need, but you're going to have to pay tax on it?

Retirement is not part of the criteria for getting one of these. If someone is middle-aged, they are obviously not going to be retired. If they get Medicare it is because they have been disabled and certified so by their physicians. If people have these and do not really need them, then it is the physicians who prescribe them that are writing up fraudulent reports and scrips. That should definitely be investigated.

You're only one of many who brought up the stereotype of fat, lazy people and showed your disgust for those who must use powerized wheelchairs. You didn't address any of the other necessary and life-saving devices that are included in this list of taxed items. It's easy enough, I suppose, to be prejudiced against others who are less able than you, but no one should feel they are safe from disability and none of us is safe from old age.

"Who estimated that less than 20% of people who have them really need them?"

This number came from Medicare, and they stared to crack down on this end of the program, but you have picked up on the story, and you see what the makers of the chairs are doing.

"In fact, Obama told us that Medicare has enough fraud and waste to pay for the whole health care reform. Why not clean up the fraud in the system rather than tax people on the fraudulent pay outs?"

Rollo, you are the one that started a discussion about this. When medicare cuts funding for these chairs the company that makes them just hires a PR department, and blast Obama, and the government. It worked on YOU. I have no idea how you haven't seen the ads for places like the Scooter Store who promise you a Scooter. How do you think they can do this?

"If people have these and do not really need them, then it is the physicians who prescribe them that are writing up fraudulent reports and scrips. That should definitely be investigated."

So you now want to increase malpractice insurance? If a physician declares someone to be disabled that doesn't mean that they want the person to get a scooter.


"You didn't address any of the other necessary and life-saving devices that are included in this list of taxed items."

This is because I know something about this stuff because a guy that worked for the same company as I do went into this business, and told me all about it. He said that he could get anyone on medicare/medicaid approved for a scooter, or other things that they don't really need, and he make a fortune.

"It's easy enough, I suppose, to be prejudiced against others who are less able than you, but no one should feel they are safe from disability and none of us is safe from old age."

Rollo, that is BS. I am pointing out that from the study by medicare, that there are many people that have these scooters don't need them. Do you know how many times I have heard republicans say that we should eliminate medicare/medicaid? I am pointing out that there are people that have these scooters, that I have seen have no problems getting around without them.

Again, you address only the scooters, which by the way, are not the only form of motorized wheelchair. I suppose you're one of those people who huff and puff about the disabled person in the grocery store, taking up so much space in the aisle with that scooter, when you are sure they can walk.

Not everyone who is disabled, looks disabled. In fact, you may not know their distance ability, or strength. You really don't know anything by looking at them except what you can see with your eyes and you really just don't like them. Your sympathy for the poor and ill is conditional, I suppose. Can you not see how petty you appear when you accuse them all of being too lazy to walk?

You haven't pointed out any study to me that supports your statement, it is still just your statement.

As to physicians and disability certification, they need more than that to get a wheelchair, the patient needs a prescription. The doctor has to certify that they need this chair.

You didn't answer me why the government would not stop fraud and waste rather than let it continue and then just tax it.

I suppose that people who need ventilators are just too lazy to breathe. The government should crack down on these people. The rest of us have to breathe, why can't they? Why do you care about people who don't have enough money to pay for insurance but hate those who are ill and have disabilities? Why is it you can give sympathy to one set of people and not to another? Why do you feel this disgust for the disabled?

"Again, you address only the scooters, which by the way, are not the only form of motorized wheelchair."

Like I said, I only addressed this because I have seen this first hand, and know what does on.

"I suppose you're one of those people who huff and puff about the disabled person in the grocery store, taking up so much space in the aisle with that scooter, when you are sure they can walk."

This is what normal people call Assuming. Didn't your mother tell you what you are doing when you assume? Apparently NOT!!

"Not everyone who is disabled, looks disabled. In fact, you may not know their distance ability, or strength. You really don't know anything by looking at them except what you can see with your eyes and you really just don't like them. Your sympathy for the poor and ill is conditional, I suppose. Can you not see how petty you appear when you accuse them all of being too lazy to walk?"

I am not saying that everyone that has one of these isn't disabled, or doesn't need one. I am saying that this program is full of abuse and fraud, and it is costing the nation millions. I am not accuse "all of them" of anything, I am just pointing out the fact that I have seen people use these and then walk around like nothing is wrong.


"You haven't pointed out any study to me that supports your statement, it is still just your statement."

You haven't point out any study to show different from the one I saw.

"You didn't answer me why the government would not stop fraud and waste rather than let it continue and then just tax it."

Because they are already cutting out all of the fraud and waste to pay for health care. Any more questions?

"I suppose that people who need ventilators are just too lazy to breathe. The government should crack down on these people. The rest of us have to breathe, why can't they?"

Rollo, how hard is it to fake breathing? That was a pretty stupid comment.

"Why do you care about people who don't have enough money to pay for insurance but hate those who are ill and have disabilities?"

I don't "hate" anyone, I just don't like people cheating our system for no reason at all. Just like you!

"Why is it you can give sympathy to one set of people and not to another? Why do you feel this disgust for the disabled?"

I don't feel disgust for disabled people, I feel disgust for people that are cheating the system. Just like you!

There is definitely too much fraud and abuse in the system. An itemized hospital bill will definitely yield some insane charges, especially if you contrast what they are calling it and charging with what you actually experienced being done. But that's the nature of medical billing. Everything has a code and a price range.

I would only take exception to your statement "most people in wheelchairs more than likely aren't working, the wheelchair is being bought courtesy of the taxpayer through medicare/medicaid." Most of the time, when you are talking about people on retirement or disability, they have already worked and paid in their Social Security and Medicare taxes. If the government miscalculated the stability of the system, that is not the fault of those workers who paid the dues and now are collecting the benefits they were promised.

I agree with what you said about them paying into the system and all that, but that doesn't change the fact, they are taxing the people that they are providing for. so, in the long run they are going to have to provide more to them, so where is the savings going to come from?

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Like most people with opinions, I've been bashed over the head for my view to no end. But I hold fast to what I've said for the longest time: if you're a liberal, it's basically okay to hate. You're in an enormous group of linkeminded people who, even if they don't feel the exact same, will never speak out against you. Liberal on liberal criticism (the real kind of criticsim; not criticizing because they're not liberal enough) is like finding a leprechaun in the clover patch.

It seems that they've always dictated the terms of hatred.

Obviously, hate isn't reserved for politics or any types of labels. Everyone can hate. The right does the same thing. The only real differences being that 1) the right doesn't hold itself up to be this pillar of moral superiority. Even in the strongest religious circles, everyone's aware that man falls short of a God. So the right has never claimed to be what the anti-Christian, secular, wonderful, wealth-sharing uptopists claim.

And 2) there's an entire culture driven by celebrity and media that continuously pushes one ideology while leaving the other stranded; and within that marketed ideology, there's hatred for numerous things, including, most of all, anyone not subscribing to the same ideology and nearly everyone not walking the thin line they draw... and erase and draw, and erase and draw, etc.

Today it's fat people. Today it's right-wingers (read: non-liberal zealots/dissenters). Yesterday it was black folks.

Eventually, they'll embrace another "group" and then point their fingers at everyone else, claiming we're the ones behind it all.

Ice water may work, but it isn't nearly painful enough!