AEI's Kevin Hassett looks at the Joint Committee on Taxation's analysis of the "America's Healthy Future Act of 2009" and concludes:
Ostensibly the excise tax is a tax on insurers. But as with other excise taxes (gasoline, cigarettes), the cost would undoubtedly be passed on to the consumer, in the form of more expensive insurance. Or firms might stop offering generous plans and increase wages commensurately, which would also increase tax revenue. The analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation concluded that tax payments would indeed rise. And it found that the middle class would be stuck with the tab. The report projected that the excise tax would raise about $52 billion in 2019. Of that, about $8.9 billion would come from taxpayers with incomes of less than $50,000; about $19.4 billion from taxpayers with incomes between $50,000 and $100,000; and about $17.4 billion from taxpayers with incomes between $100,000 and $200,000. Add those up, and you see that about 87 percent of the revenue in the original Baucus proposal to finance Obamacare would come from individuals with incomes of less than $200,000.
The funny thing about tax hikes on "the rich" is that the higher such taxes go, the lower the threshold at which one becomes "rich" falls. More on the tax hikes included in "health care reform" here. JCT report here.