It's interesting that the story doesn't mention that Baucus was the one who put it in the healthcare bill in the first place. He's got some good people working for him to pull that PR off.
I was shocked to read about this requirement snuck into the health care bill. It is insane.
Can you imagine anyone who buys a computer needing to send HP or Dell a W-9 to request their tax id, then waiting for the response, and then filing a 1099? I can't imagine what was going through the lawmaker's heads.
Pretty much all goods would start to be priced at $599.
Individuals wouldn't have to file 1099s in any case; if the law went into effect, it'd be only for businesses. It would still be a hassle for businesses buying equipment, but not quite the same as your grandmother having to send Dell a 1099 when buying a home computer.
Since the 1099 requirement was put in to recover more revenues and improve the healthcare bill's financial justification, if that requirement is repealed, should Congress re-evaluate the healthcare bill based on the new (worse) numbers?
Regardless of whether they repeal this portion of the Obamacare bill won't make a difference. Practically, the IRS is ill equipped to handle the flood of 1099s of taxpayers actually obey the letter of the law. lol. The only way they could handle this type of data and paper is if they require everyone to efile by law and eliminate paper totally.
