Bar-On pushing health tax for housewives - Haaretz

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Thu., September 20, 2007 ,

Israel Time: 03:21 (EST+7)

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Bar-On pushing health tax for housewives

By Moti Bassok

Finance Minister Roni Bar-On will ask the government to reapprove an NIS 86 a month health tax on housewives.

The proposal had been foiled last Monday by MK Yitzhak Cohen (Shas).

The Finance Ministry claims that 450,000 housewives are currently exempted from the health tax, but meanwhile, they are entitled to full health benefits under the state-funded health insurance.

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Cohen blocked a cabinet decision dating from August 12 this year to slap health tax on housewives, as requested by the treasury, in the ministerial committee on economic legislation chaired by Bar-On.

On September 5 the cabinet's proposal was approved in the ministerial committee, and on September 17, based on the finance minister's recommendation, the committee ruled that the National Insurance Institute (NII) could levy a health tax of at least 75 percent of all housewives.

The treasury's position is that everybody in the land, the entire population is subject to health tax, including those who do not work, such as the unemployed, students and recipients of various allowances. Collection of tax from housewives is expected to increase NII revenues by about NIS 500 million annually.

The decision was cancelled in light of MK Cohen's objection, and the only recourse for reviving the tax is to ask the cabinet to reapprove the August 12 decision. Shas, a member of the ruling coalition, has already voted against the 2008 budget, and is likely to oppose the tax when it is brought to Knesset debate as part of the Economic Arrangements Law. In such a case it is unlikely that the proposed tax will receive a majority.

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