Warren Buffett, the multi-billionaire CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, called the GOP approach to healthcare reform into question on Tuesday.
Warren Buffett, the multi-billionaire CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, called the GOP approach to health care reform into question on Tuesday.
During an interview on 'PBS NewsHour,' Buffett noted that the Republican’s approach would result in very rich people, like him, reaping immense benefits.
As evidence, he provided a copy of his 2016 taxes.
Buffett said, “… if the Republican — well, if the bill that passed the House with 217 votes had been in effect this year, I would have saved — I can give you the exact figure. I would have saved $679,999, or over 17 percent of my tax bill.”
He continued, “There’s nothing ambiguous about that. I will be given a 17 percent tax cut. And the people it’s directed at are couples with $250,000 or more of income. You could entitle this, you know, Relief for the Rich Act or something, because it — I have got friends where it would have saved them as much as — it gets into the $10-million-and-up figure.”
Buffett is not the only one to have noticed the stunning flow of money headed for the nation’s wealthiest should the GOP pass the legislation it’s presented thus far.
In its analysis of the Senate health care bill, the Tax Policy Center found that Americans earning $875,000 or more would enjoy, on average, $45,000 in tax savings.
Former President Obama has also weighed in on the matter.
He said in a June 22 Facebook post, “The Senate bill, unveiled today, is not a health care bill. It’s a massive transfer of wealth from middle-class and poor families to the richest people in America. It hands enormous tax cuts to the rich and to the drug and insurance industries, paid for by cutting health care for everybody else.”