A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to apply inflation adjustments to the additional hospital insurance tax on high income taxpayers.
Key claim: S5085 would amend the Internal Revenue Code to apply inflation adjustments to the additional hospital insurance tax on high-income taxpayers.
Abstract
(S5085 · 119th Congress) Latest action (2026-07-22): Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance.
Why this matters
The 0.9% Additional Medicare hospital insurance tax applies above $200,000 (single) / $250,000 (joint) thresholds that have never been indexed since enactment in 2010, causing a growing share of taxpayers to owe it over time. Indexing these thresholds to inflation would reduce revenue collected from upper-middle-income earners and slow the expansion of the tax’s reach, without altering the underlying 0.9% rate. The proposal fits a broader pattern of bills seeking to index long-static IRC thresholds (e.g., Social Security benefit taxation base amounts) to inflation.