[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 16028]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               CLASS ACT

  (Mr. BURGESS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, last week, Secretary of Health and Human 
Services Kathleen Sebelius announced that despite her Department's best 
efforts, what is known as the CLASS Act is not fiscally viable and will 
not be implemented.
  The CLASS Act would have created a long-term care insurance option 
for employees. But you know what? It had been called a Ponzi scheme of 
the first order. Not my words, not even my Governor's words. Those are 
the words of Senator Kent Conrad, the Democratic chairman of the Senate 
Budget Committee.
  Mr. Speaker, this is just another example of bad policy that was 
caused by the rushed approach to create and pass the Patient Protection 
and Affordable Care Act. Instead of focusing on reducing the price of 
long-term care insurance, the CLASS Act would have cost the taxpayers 
more money for the creation of yet another Federal program.
  Now, incredibly, the CLASS Act is being abandoned by the Department 
of Health and Human Services, but the President refuses to let it go. 
We'll have a hearing on this in my committee later this week, Energy 
and Commerce.
  But, Mr. Speaker, we can and we must do better. We need to repeal 
this health care law and replace it with commonsense market-based 
solutions that enhance our medical system, put the patient at the 
center of care, and drive down the cost of health care.

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