April 7, 2008
Albuquerque Journal
Coalition Has Health Plan Idea
By Winthrop Quigley; Journal Staff WriterBusiness opponents of Gov. Bill Richardson's health coverage plan have this advice for legislators attending the special session planned for this summer: Spread the pain around.
Instead of taxing employers to create a healthy workforce fund, as originally proposed, consider a broad-based tax to expand existing coverage programs, said two members of a state business coalition that opposed universal health care coverage legislation the Richardson administration crafted.
"The main thing we were against was the expense was all on the backs of employers," said New Mexico Restaurant Association CEO Carol Wight.
"We understand there needs to be employer participation, but all of us need to participate," said Association of Commerce and Industry President Beverlee McClure.
"It may be if we find a way for all of us to participate through the gross receipts tax or other mechanism, you might find ACI would participate in looking at those options," McClure said.
Richardson announced in February, after what he called a "productive" meeting with state Senate leaders, that he will call a special session some time this summer to enact a program to bring health care coverage to New Mexico's 400,000 uninsured residents.
In its regular 30-day session that ended Feb. 14, the Legislature first gutted then killed a Richardson plan that, among other things, would have taxed employers who didn't offer health insurance to workers.
Richardson said at the end of the session that he would propose the identical bill in a special session. Thursday, he said legislators and members of his administration would look for consensus before the special session convenes.
Aside from the burden on employers, Wight and McClure said, their groups are skeptical the original plan would have got that many more people insured.
The bill said individuals had to find some coverage, but nothing in the bill, had it become law, would have forced anyone to get it, McClure said.
She said that about half of the state's uninsured already qualify for some kind of coverage or public program, and they still don't sign up.
Wight said her members have tried to get their employees to sign up for State Coverage Insurance, a low-cost, state-subsidized health insurance product that requires both employers and employees to pay some of the cost.
"They refuse it," she said. "They want to pay their cable bill. They want to pay their cell phone bill."
A place to begin, McClure said, is improving recruitment of qualified people into existing public programs, especially Medicaid.
Under the governor's plan, the employer tax would feed a fund that could have been used for pretty much anything, McClure said. A better idea would be to create a fund dedicated to expanding existing public programs, she said.
Pegging coverage to employment won't work, Wight said.
"I'm going to say over half of those (400,000) people are not employed," Wight said. "They're students, children and retirees, possibly, who don't fit into Medicare yet. If we're counting on employers to pick up that tab, we're approaching it incorrectly because so many of them are not employed. A better solution would be a broader tax and make it the responsibility of all New Mexicans."
The Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce broke with other business organizations and supported Richardson's plan, saying that while the plan had its flaws, the cost of doing nothing was too great.
The chamber took heat from some Republican lawmakers at committee hearings for supporting the bill, and the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce blasted its Albuquerque counterpart for "consistently" backing legislation "contrary to the interests of New Mexico businesses and in direct opposition to the welfare of small businesses in the state."
In a letter it provided to the Journal, the Las Cruces chamber called the Albuquerque chamber's support of Richardson's bill "unfathomable."
Referring to the chamber's board, the Las Cruces group said, "We do not believe that a small group of 18 individuals representing big business interests, heavily state regulated industries and a few of your chosen suppliers have the right to represent yourselves as the business community. We resent and reject your on-going claims that you make to the public and legislators that you are the voice of business, especially small businesses which you clearly do not represent."
Albuquerque chamber President Terri Cole said in an e-mail to the Journal that business pays for uncompensated health care already, through higher premiums and taxes, so providing universal coverage ultimately reduces costs to business.
"The bill represented a solution we support— universal coverage without over-burdening those businesses who provide coverage and those who do not," Cole said.
"The bill provided an incentive for businesses that don't provide coverage to seek out existing, low-cost, under-utilized programs," she said. "We believe that approach was a win-win for everyone."