Who pays for ObamaCare fees and excise taxes?

(By Ed Morrissey, Hot Air) - We hear plenty about how the White House and Congress have insisted that a health-care overhaul will get paid by either the rich or the insurers and pharmaceutical companies with massive new fees. But will they pay the costs of these fees, or will those fees get spread to consumers? It hardly comes as a shock that an industry with an average 3.3% profit margin won’t be able to sustain an excise fee of 35% without either rapidly downsizing or hiking insurance premiums, or going out of business altogether. A new analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation and former CBO director Douglas Holtz-Eakin shows that the distribution of the excise tax and other fees on the health insurers will mean higher costs borne primarily by the middle class.