You Might Pay A Lot More Than $95 For Skipping Health Insurance
2014 is the first year most Americans will have to either have health insurance or face a tax penalty.
But most people who are aware of the penalty think it's pretty small, at least for this first year. And that could turn into an expensive mistake.
"I'd say the vast majority of people I've dealt with really believe that the penalty is only $95, if they know about it at all," says Brian Haile, senior vice president for health policy at Jackson Hewitt Tax Service. "And when people find out, they're stunned. It's much, much higher than they would expect."
In fact, "the penalty is the maximum of either $95 or 1 percent of taxable income in 2014," according to Linda Blumberg, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute's Health Policy Center. "For people with higher incomes, it can be much more sizable than $95."
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