Health & Welfare Plans Newsletter |
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| July 16, 2009 \ Compliance \ Costs \ Administration \ Design \ Policy | ||
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Senate Eyes 25-Employee Threshold for Health Mandate
Excerpt: "Businesses with 25 employees or more would be required to offer health insurance or pay $750 a year per full-time worker to the federal government, under health care reform legislation being considered in the U.S. Senate. A 'play or pay' employer mandate has been looming for months, but Democrats on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee finally defined how small a business would need to be in order to be exempted from the requirement." (Portland Business Journal via bizjournals.com; free registration required)
Healthy Habits May Cut Price of Insurance
Excerpt: "Workers who quit smoking, lose weight, and eat right could have their health insurance premiums cut by as much as half, possibly saving them thousands of dollars per year, under a measure inserted with little notice this week into the Senate healthcare overhaul bill. The move represents a potential breakthrough on one of the most controversial elements of healthcare overhaul: how to get Americans to improve their well-being without turning government into a medical version of Big Brother." (The Boston Globe)
States Unsure of How to Fund OPEB Liabilities
Excerpt: "States have unfunded liabilities for retiree health care of about $558 billion, according to a report from the Center for State and Local Government Excellence. Among the states whose actuarial reports the project examined, North Dakota ($31 million), Wyoming ($72 million), Iowa ($0.2 billion), Oregon ($0.3 billion), Rhode Island ($0.5 billion), and Oklahoma ($0.8 billion) have the lowest reported unfunded liabilities. New Jersey ($68.8 billion), New York ($49.7 billion), California ($47.9 billion), North Carolina ($23.8 billion) Connecticut ($21.7 billion), Louisiana ($19.6 billion), and Texas ($17.7 billion) have the highest." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)
More Americans Losing Health Coverage (PDF)
8 pages. Excerpt: "In this report, Families USA provides the first ever state-by-state illustration of the number of people who may lose health coverage between the beginning of 2008 (the period immediately after the last Census Bureau report on the number of uninsured) and the end of 2010 (the close of the current 111th Congress). . . . With each passing week that meaningful health care reform is not enacted, more families in every state are losing health coverage . . .: 44,230 more people are losing health coverage each week. 191,670 more people are losing health coverage each month. 2.3 million more people are losing health coverage each year." (Families USA)
Employers Council on Flexible Compensation Creates Website to Lobby for Protection of Flexible Spending Accounts
Excerpt: "Save Flexible Spending Plans (FSAs) is a national grassroots advocacy campaign to protect against the elimination of flexible spending accounts as an option to help fund a small portion of the costs for health care reform efforts. The campaign is bringing together and giving a voice to the millions of Americans who rely on FSAs to manage and pay for their health care costs." (Save Flexible Spending Plans)
Massachusetts Drops Health Coverage for 30,000 Immigrants
Excerpt: "The new state budget in Massachusetts eliminates health care coverage for some 30,000 legal immigrants to help close a growing deficit, reversing progress toward universal coverage just as Congress looks to the state as a model for overhauling the nation's health care system. The affected immigrants, permanent residents who have had green cards for less than five years, are now covered under Commonwealth Care, a subsidized insurance program for low-income residents that is central to the groundbreaking health care law enacted here in 2006. Critics of the cut, which would save an estimated $130 million, say it unfairly targets taxpaying residents and threatens the state's health care experiment at a critical time." (The New York Times; free registration required)
Target and Kelly Services May Back Mandated Health Care
Excerpt: "Target Corp. and Kelly Services Inc. said they may support Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s call for mandatory medical insurance by large companies as part of a proposed overhaul of U.S. health care. . . . The positions of the two companies signal a widening split in the business community over the issue, a core element of President Barack Obama's proposed changes. Yesterday, the National Retail Federation, the industry's largest trade group, told members to 'come out swinging' against Wal-Mart's call for federally mandated company health insurance." (Bloomberg L.P.)
How Much Health Care for $1 Trillion?
Excerpt: "The White House and Democratic congressional leaders, scrambling to pass health care bills within the next few weeks, are trying to keep the cost of legislation that expands coverage and controls costs to about $1 trillion over 10 years -- a benchmark for moderates in both parties. So what can you buy for $1 trillion? Although the eye-popping price tag would help boost insurance coverage to 95% or more of the public, it's not enough to do everything advocates initially want." (USA Today)
Insurers Offer Benefits Bundles
Excerpt: "Insurers are offering small businesses a new way to cap the cost of insurance coverage for workers and their families through contracts for bundles of group disability, life and other insurance benefits. The platforms allow small-business owners to create a baseline of group benefits, which they can fully or partially subsidize for eligible workers and their dependents. It doesn't include medical coverage, which is contracted separately. Employees can purchase supplemental coverage and pick from a range of other voluntary benefits, such as short-term disability policies and critical-illness insurance, which they would pay for out of pocket but at discounted group rates obtained by the employer." (The Wall Street Journal)
[Opinion]
Why We Must Ration Health Care
Excerpt: "In the current U.S. debate over health care reform, 'rationing' has become a dirty word. Meeting last month with five governors, President Obama urged them to avoid using the term, apparently for fear of evoking the hostile response that sank the Clintons' attempt to achieve reform. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed published at the end of last year with the headline 'Obama Will Ration Your Health Care,' Sally Pipes, C.E.O. of the conservative Pacific Research Institute, described how in Britain the national health service does not pay for drugs that are regarded as not offering good value for money, and added, 'Americans will not put up with such limits, nor will our elected representatives.' And the Democratic chair of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Max Baucus, told CNSNews in April, 'There is no rationing of health care at all' in the proposed reform." (The New York Times; free registration required)
[Opinion]
Health Care Reform Requires Law Reform
Excerpt: "Health care financing and delivery reform seems to be under way. Reform will in all likelihood originate with Congress but may also come from the states or even the private sector. Federal law, however, limits states' options for reform, while state law constrains federal reform, and both state and federal law impede private innovation. Congressional action could facilitate state reform. Alternatively, federal preemption of state law may be necessary for federal reform. If neither Congress nor the states act, action by federal agencies could support private innovation. In any event, law reform is a necessary condition for health reform." (Health Affairs)
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[Guidance Overview]Governance and Compliance Advisory Update: July 2009
Excerpt: "In July, legislation introduced in the House focused on protecting participants in defined contribution plans by encouraging plans to offer (and participants to elect) lifetime annuity payments when they retire and by introducing a fee disclosure bill. . . . An IRS official commented on when sample plan language waiving required minimum distributions and a sample 402(f) notice can be expected. Also in the courts, the Third Circuit became the latest circuit to consider standards established by the Supreme Court in Met Life v. Glenn addressing conflicts of interest in ERISA benefit claims. Lastly, continuing a nationwide trend, New Hampshire enacted legislation legalizing same-gender marriage, and Nevada approved a domestic partner law." (Towers Perrin)
Press Releases
House Health Care Bill Vital Step Toward Health Care for AllCommunications Workers of America
Providing Answers That the President Won't Provide
Council for Affordable Health Insurance
Sustainable Workplace Means Addressing Employee Well-being, Too, According to Stanford Business School Research
Stanford Graduate School of Business
Thousands of Disney Workers and Delegates to National Episcopalian Convention March On Disneyland
UNITE HERE Local 11
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Employee Benefits Jobs
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