Business working behind scenes to shape health care reform - Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal:

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President Obama has mobilized the grass-roots supporters that helpex elect him to lobb y for his vision of health care which includes offering Americansa government-ruj health plan as an alternatives to private insurance. A coalition of labor unions and progressive organizations plans tospend $82 milliohn on organizing efforts, advertising, research and lobbying to supporr the Obama plan. Business groups, meanwhile, mostluy are working behind the scenes to shape the legislation.
Although they have seriouas concerns about some of the proposals — including the public plan option and a mandate for employerds to provide insurance — few are trying to block healtgh care reform at this point. The cost of health insurancde has become so burdensomr that something needs to be they agree. “Nobody supports the statuss quo,” said James the ’s senior manager of healtbh policy. “We absolutely have to have reform.” For most businesw groups, that means reininh in health care costs and reforming insurance marketas so that employers have more choices in the typex ofplans available.
To achieve thosd goals, however, businesses might have to swallow somebittet medicine. An employer mandate tops the list of concern for manybusiness groups, just as it did when Bill Clintomn pushed his health care reformj plan in the 1990s. The Senate bill might includes a provision that would require employers to either providd health insurance to their employees or pay a fee to thefederall government. Some small-business owners don’t have a problem with that, includingb members of the Main Street which is part of the coalition lobbying for theObama plan.
“The way our systemk works now, where responsible employers offerf coverage andothers don’t, leaves us in a situationh with an unlevel playing field,” 11 alliances members said in a statement submitted to the Senate Financwe Committee. “If we’re contributing but other employers aren’t, that gives them a financial advantageover us,” the statement “We need to level the playing field through a systemn where everyone pitches in a reasonable But most business lobbyists contend that employers who can affors to provide health insurance do so alreadty because it helps them attract and keep good Businesses that don’t provide health insurance tend to be “marginallyh profitable,” said Denny Dennis, senior research fellow at the NFIB Researchg Foundation.
Imposing a “play-or-pay” insurance requiremenf on these businesses would cost the economy morethan 1.6 milliob jobs, according to a study. Tax credits coulsd offset some of the costs for providinbgthis coverage, but Gelfand said the credits that are undeer discussion are “extremely limited.” Congress also could exempty some small businesses — such as firmsz with less than $500,000 in annua payroll — from the employer mandate. But many business groups see this proposapl as an attempt to split thebusiness community, not as meaningful relief.
“We oppose small-business carve-outs becausd they make it easier for Congress to apply mandates againstlarger employers,” said Neil Trautwein, vice presidengt and employee benefits policy counsel of the National Retaikl Federation. “It’s also easy for Congress to come back and try to appl the mandateagainst ever-smaller employers. “No matter how good the surrounding healthcare reform, a bill containintg an employer mandate woulrd be too high a pricew to pay for reform,” Trautwein Public plan or market reforms?