Tell Congress: Don’t Tax Working Families’ Health Care Benefits
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Today, union leaders are meeting with President Obama to discuss the next step in health care reform legislation, especially the tax on workers’ health care benefits in the Senate bill. On Wednesday, you can join the fight to pass health care reform that works for working families as part of the AFL-CIO’s National Call-In Blitz to the U.S. House.
Both the House and Senate have passed health care reform bills that will be merged into final legislation over the next few weeks. The House version is far better for working families.
Overall, the House bill comes closer to AFL-CIO’s health care reform goals, including a public health care option, a much stronger employer fair share provision and no tax on workers’ health care benefits.
While the Senate bill has many good points, it is deeply flawed. Click here to compare the two.
Health Care Reform Tax Hits More Chevys Than Caddies
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Working families, their unions and health care activists are continuing their battle to ensure that the final health care reform package being hammered out in negotiations between House and Senate leaders is real and meaningful reform. (Click here to find out more about the two bills and next week’s National Call-In Day for health care reform.)
The hot topic on the blogs and in the mainstream media is the fate of the tax on workers’ health benefits that is part of the Senate-passed bill.
Backers of the tax say it would impact only “Cadillac plans” but the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) calls that an “urban legend.” Says EPI economist Josh Bevins:
The excise tax proponents say their target is a Cadillac, but in reality they’re about as likely to hit a Chevy. The excise tax is not a progressive levy on lavish plans. Instead it’s a tax that will hit small businesses, older workers, and those most in need of health care the hardest.
House or Senate Health Care Reform? Compare for Yourself
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Over the coming days—and maybe weeks—U.S. House and Senate leaders, along with the Obama White House, will be working to shape one health care reform bill from the two each chamber passed earlier this year.
Now is a good time to compare the two and we’ve posted a comparison here. After you’ve compared the bills, mark you calendar for Jan. 13 to join in a National Call-In Day to the House to demand health care reform that works for working families. See details below.
The pair has many common elements that will help working families cope with the ever-rising costs of health care and address serious flaws and shortcomings in the nation’s health care system.
Health care reform advocates say that more than three-quarters of the bills’ provisions share such features as consumer protections, more affordable coverage for active workers and retirees and seniors, expanded coverage and cost containment.
Senate Passes Health Care Bill
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The Senate passed health care reform by a 60-39 margin shortly after 7 a.m. today.
While passage of this legislation continues the momentum for health care reform, the Senate bill itself doesn’t live up to the kind of reform we need. The bill has many positive features, but it falls short in three key areas:
• It is paid for by a tax on working families’ health benefits.
• It fails to provide a public health insurance option, which would control costs by giving insurance companies real competition.
• It does not do enough to make sure employers are living up to their responsibility.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said:
For this health care bill to be worthy of the support of working men and women, substantial changes must be made. The AFL-CIO intends to fight on behalf of all working families to make those changes and win health care reform that is deserving of the name.
The House bill is the model for genuine health care reform. Working people cannot accept anything less than real reform.
Trumka: Senate Health Care Bill Must Change to Be Real Reform
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The health care bill being considered by the U.S. Senate is inadequate and too tilted toward the insurance industry, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said today.
In recent days, as the Senate has debated health care reform, small numbers of senators have held health care hostage by threatening to block a vote. The new proposal by the Senate puts the interests of insurance companies—and senators who would rather look out for the insurance companies—ahead of real reform.
Trumka said the top priority now is to fight over the rest of the legislative process to fix the bill and make sure we can pass real health care reform:
The labor movement has been fighting for health care for nearly 100 years and we are not about to stop fighting now, when it really matters. But for this health care bill to be worthy of the support of working men and women, substantial changes must be made. The AFL-CIO intends to fight on behalf of all working families to make those changes and win health care reform that is deserving of the name.
Delivering Letters—and a Message to Congress on Health Care
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This week, union leaders and activists visited more than 100 members of Congress to deliver thousands of letters from union members with a simple message: Pass real health care reform now-without a new tax on workers’ benefits.
Mark Whetstone and Gloria Kortum, two AFGE members, flew in from Nebraska on Wednesday to ask Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) to support real health care reform. Kortum and Whetstone say they’re concerned about the effects of the health care crisis on families and small businesses in Nebraska—and they hope that reform will be fairly financed, not by taxing benefits. Whetstone said:
One of the prime concerns for federal employees is the tax in the bill. It will have ramifications well into the future. We want to make sure Sen. Nelson knows we’re concerned about legislation that contains an excise tax. We know he’s a pivotal vote and he needs to hear from his constituents.
Fighting for Real Reform on Capitol Hill and Across the Country
Today and tomorrow, more than 100 union leaders and activists from around the nation are visiting their senators and representatives to let them know they urgently need to pass health care reform—the right way.
The exact shape of the Senate’s bill is in flux right now, and the union leaders are pressing members of Congress on three key issues:
• Inclusion of a public health insurance option;
• Making sure employers do their part in providing health care for employees; and
• Stopping a new tax on working family health benefits.
Union activists are also bringing thousands of handwritten letters to members of Congress to let them know their constituents want reform and are worried about a tax on benefits.
Freshman Senators Fight for Lower Costs in Health Care
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Today in the U.S. Senate, 11 first-term senators are introducing a package of amendments that will improve the Senate’s health care bill by getting health care costs under control.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says the Senate should pass this set of amendments to improve health care for all families and make our health care system more sustainable in the long term:
These senators have their eyes on what’s most important to all Americans—affordable, high-quality health care that will be there when we need it. We must transform our current health care system into one that rewards value-constraining cost growth without compromising care.
A number of the amendments announced today would, individually, represent significant steps forward from the current draft Senate legislation. Taken together, however, they amount to a robust expansion of critically important provisions in the legislation.
At Roundtables, Union Members Call for Health Care Reform
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Rosie Britz, a member of the Plumbers and Pipe Fitters (UA), is just one of thousands of union volunteers who have put time and effort into the fight for health care reform. Britz says health care reform is critical for the uninsured—as well as ensuring people like her, who have insurance, have more security:
“This health care bill will be a safety net for all of us construction workers. It’s got to get done. We cannot sit on our hands and hope someone else will do it.”
Britz was one of the union members who attended a roundtable discussion Tuesday in Mosinee, Wis., one of several roundtables around the country this week to get the word out about the need for health care reform. Union members, community allies and small business owners also came together for health care roundtables in South Bend and other Indiana cities.
You can be a part of the effort. Contact your senators and ask for real health care reform.
New Report Shows Health Care Reform Will Lower Cost
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The next two weeks will be a pivotal time in the nation’s history as the U.S. Senate debates health care reform.
Health care reform will help control costs to families, lowering out-of-pocket costs for most people buying insurance, according to a new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report. But there’s still a long way to go to make the Senate’s bill into the kind of reform our country needs, and union members are taking the lead in that fight.
This week and next, union members, unemployed workers, faith leaders and community allies of health care reform will join together for roundtable discussions in key states like Indiana, Nebraska and Louisiana. They’ll share real-life stories about their experiences with the nation’s broken health care system and what we need to do to fix it.
Union leaders from around the country also will be coming to Washington, D.C., next week to visit members of Congress and emphasize the message that hundreds of thousands of union members and allies have delivered letters and made phone calls all year: We need health care reform that works for working families.
