New health care bill
by Josh at 3:55 pmI got an email from the GBIO main office last week about the final health care legislation set to be released by the health care conference committee tomorrow. The email also said that a memo from Health Care For All would be posted on the GBIO web site this weekend outlining what is believed to be included in the bill, but as of this writing nothing has gone up on the web site. In reality, nobody knows what’s going in the bill.
The Boston Globe ran two stories with contradictory reports as to what the bill contained. The first article suggests that Governor Romney might actually sign the new bill because adding a new $295-per-worker assessment to employers who don’t provide health care for their employees while removeing the existing $62-per worker charge on those that do would constitute a restructuring of taxes rather than a new tax. So the Governor would not have to break his pledge to add no new taxes. The second article suggests that the new $295-per-woprker assessment would be included without removing the existing $62-per-worker charge. It notes that Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform recommends removing th $62-per-worker charge to offset the new assessment. I know that one of the big points of our ballot innitiative was that we were going to lower health insurance premiums by removing the $62-per-worker charge. It seemed unjust to us to charge employers who were already being socially responsible by providing insurance to their employees.
On a related note, Matt Lacey of the Center for Faith in Politics and Amy Ridenour of the National Center for Public Policy Research are having a blog debate about universal health care. I’ve steered them both towards Malcolm Gladwell’s blog where he’s been discussing the merits of universal health care. I’m planning to email both Malcom Gladwell and Amy Ridenour. I’d be curious to see how Malcom Gladwell would respond to Amy Ridenour’s post on health care. I’m also curious to see what Amy Ridenour thinks of the health care legistaltion we’re trying to pass in Massachusetts.
Tags: Activism,boston,gbio,healthcare,politics,Religion
