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Roth Urges Kennedy Not to Abandon Health Care Reform Bill

Monday , June 10, 1996

Deloitte & Touche OnLine

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Bill Roth, R-Del., is urging Sen. Ted Kennedy, R-Mass., not to abandon the effort to pass the health care reform bill (HR 3103) over the issue of including Medical Savings Account provisions in the measure.

Medical Savings Accounts are like Individual Retirement Accounts -- individuals can deposit pretax (or tax-deductible) money into them and use that money to pay for routine medical expenses. The people then can buy catastrophic health insurance policies that are less expensive than traditional health insurance because they have high deductibles (up to $4,000 per family) and use the money in their medical savings accounts to pay their medical bills.

Supporters of MSAs think they lower the cost of health insurance for everyone and offer people portable health insurance they can take from job to job. Critics of MSAs are afraid that healthy and younger people will opt for the high-deductible, cheaper health insurance plans, leaving behind a pool of sicker, poorer people, making other health insurance options very expensive.

The controversy over MSAs and the health reform bill centers on the House’s insistence that the Senate agree to include MSAs in the final version of the bill even though a majority of the Senate opposed the MSA language when they voted on the issue.

To defeat the MSA proponents, Kennedy has been opposing the appointment of Senate conferees to the House-Senate conference that must meet to work out the differences between the two versions of the bill.

"I am greatly disappointed that Sen. Kennedy is continuing to hold up action on critical health insurance reform. ...We are so close to making this health insurance reform a reality," Roth said in a June 7 Finance Committee press release.

A possible compromise has been offered by Sen. Nancy Kassebaum, R-Kan., that is geared toward small employers with fewer than 50 workers, CongressDaily news service reported Monday.

Democratic opposition to the MSA provision stems from the belief that it will benefit the richest and healthiest Americans and will erode support for the current health insurance system.

Finance Committee Staffers To Be Briefed: Senate Finance members’ personal staffs will be briefed by the committee staff late Monday about the items to be included in Roth’s proposed package of amendments to the House-passed small business tax incentive (HR 3448) and the adoption tax credit (HR 3286) bills.

The Committee plans to meet Wednesday to hold a drafting session on the measures.