U.S. Chamber Severely Concerned Over Health Care Regulations

June 17, 2010

Cape Fear Business News

U.S. Chamber of Commerce Senior Vice President of Labor, Immigration, and Employee Benefits Randel K. Johnson issued the following statement on the Administration’s release of Interim Final Regulations – meaning that there will not be the customary comment and debate periods – relating to the ability of employers to keep offering the health care plans they offered before the new health care law passed on March 23rd:

“Under the regulation, a plan could lose grandfathered status by changing a co-pay more than $5, or seeking to implement a more value-driven design. Once grandfathered status is lost, employers will be forced to follow a number of expensive new insurance rules  – which will increase costs for employers and employees, threatening the coverage Americans currently have.”

“According to the Administration’s own analysis, 51% of people will not be able to stay in grandfathered health care plans, meaning it will be difficult for employees to keep the coverage they currently have. The Administration used rosy scenarios, assuming in their analyses a sum of only 4% medical inflation, and that employers will not need to make the kind of changes in the coming years that they needed to make in the last few. In the real world employers will be under greater pressure, meaning that affording these rules will be even tougher – and that even more than 51% of people will not be able to keep their plans.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the world’s largest business federation representing the interests of more than 3 million businesses of all sizes, sectors, and regions, as well as state and local chambers and industry associations.

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