House Bill Would Make Health Savings Account Premiums Fully Tax-Deductible

A group of House Republicans on Thursday introduced a bill that would allow individuals who participate in health savings accounts to fully deduct health insurance premiums from their taxes, CongressDaily reports (Rovner, CongressDaily, 3/5). Under the new Medicare law, HSAs, which allow individuals to save tax-free funds for future medical expenses, are available to members of health plans that have a deductible higher than $1,000 for an individual and $2,000 for a family (California Healthline, 2/4). Rep. Phil Crane (R-Ill.), who sponsored the legislation with Reps. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Sam Johnson (R-Texas), said that the bill would cost an estimated $24 billion over 10 years. According to Crane, the bill, which was modeled after a proposal made by President Bush in his fiscal year 2005 budget, would make health insurance more affordable for many of the 43.6 million uninsured U.S. residents. "HSAs were a great idea. What this bill does is just makes HSAs that much better," Cantor said (CongressDaily, 3/5).