[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 80 (Wednesday, June 22, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 22, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                          HEALTH CARE MANDATES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Ramstad] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. RAMSTAD. Mr. Speaker, I, too, rise to discuss health care reform.
  I can assure the preceding speaker that I was not here in 1935, and I 
am not a nay-sayer.
  But I believe we need to work together as Republicans and Democrats, 
take off our Republican hats, take off our Democrat hats, roll up our 
sleeves, and work together in a bipartisan, pragmatic way to craft a 
sensible health care reform package.
  I also believe, looking at the empirical data, the studies that have 
been done not by so-called crackpot institutes or whatever, but the 
empirical evidence suggests that requiring employers to pay health 
insurance through imposition of an 8-percent payroll tax would be a 
disaster to the economy. The Joint Economic Committee, of which I am a 
member, recently compiled the many studies that have been done on 
mandates, and its analysis clearly shows an employer mandate like the 
one the Clintons are trying to sell to the American people will kill 
jobs and reduce wages.
  One study done by two labor economists at Drew College shows the 
losses, or I should say, the loss of 3 million jobs. Another shows the 
loss nationwide of 2 million jobs if you put an 8-percent payroll tax 
on the employers of this Nation.
  More important than the studies, I listen to the small businessmen 
and women in my district every week that I am home. Last week an owner 
of three fast food restaurants in our community came to me and showed 
me with his accountant how, if an 8-percent payroll tax is imposed, he 
will be forced to lay off 40 workers at those three fast food 
restaurants.
  Another employer, small businessperson from my district, 
came to me recently. He owns two restaurants and showed me how he will 
be forced to lay off 35 workers if the 8-percent payroll to pay for 
health care is imposed on the small businessmen and women of America.
  Those at greatest risk of losing their jobs through the employer 
mandate, make no mistake about it, are low- and middle-income workers. 
Moreover, mandates will not guarantee universal coverage.
  Many proponents of government-run socialized medicine point to Hawaii 
as an example of how mandates work. I know the Speaker is familiar with 
this, and probably will have a response at a later date, but if we look 
at Hawaii, the mandate was enacted there in 1974. There is not 
universal coverage for the uninsured. The study of Hawaii concluded 
that similar business mandates elsewhere would produce only a small 
reduction in the number of uninsured persons.
  The report by the Joint Economic Committee, Mr. Speaker, is telling. 
It starkly illustrates the clear threat to jobs, wages, and economic 
viability of an employer mandate. It shows that an employer mandate in 
any form, whether it is immediate or triggered at some date in the 
future, is a dagger pointed at the heart of our economy.

                              {time}  1930

  Mr. Speaker, we can expand health insurance coverage and control 
health care costs, but not with the bureaucratic monster and employer 
mandates.
  An employer mandate is a recipe for economic disaster.
  So, instead of killing jobs, reducing wages in a failed attempt to 
expand the health care coverage, we need a comprehensive strategy to 
reduce health care costs and expand access while maintaining the high 
quality of our health care delivery system. Health care reform 
legislation must include three cost-containment measures, at the very 
least:
  First, medical malpractice liability reform, so doctors are not 
forced every day to practice defensive medicine;
  Second, streamline administrative procedures; the paperwork, the read 
tape that right now is, according to some studies, comprising 24 
percent of health care costs;
  Third, the burdensome bureaucratic State mandates that are eating up 
dollars and not really going to quality health care.
  We can expand coverage through tax deductions, credits and vouchers 
to low- and middle-income Americans, and authorizing medical savings 
accounts to allow consumers to save for future medical expenses tax-
free. We can have reasonable and effective health care reform. I think 
such reform is both necessary and achievable, but we do not need to 
kill jobs, we do not need to destroy the current quality of care we 
enjoy in this country, in the process.
  I urge all of my colleagues to review the Joint Economic Committee 
study.
  I am convinced that, looking at the fact, the empirical data, will 
lead to a rejection of the job-killing employer mandates.
  As I said before, let us roll up our sleeves, cut out the partisan 
political rhetoric, work together in a bipartisan way to craft a 
sensible health care reform bill. If we are going to pass a bill this 
year, let us please do it right.

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