Small-business advocate taunts health providers

UPDATED:

The president of the National Federation of Independent Business, the main small-business lobby, mocked promises made this week by health care providers to squeeze $2 trillion from health costs, saying they were akin to “putting the fox in charge of henhouse security.”

Donald A. Danner told editors and reporters of The Washington Times on Thursday that insurance companies, pharmaceutical firms, doctors and hospitals “clearly have been a major part of the problem, and they have been slow to come to the table to fix it.”

At the same time, Mr. Danner’s group, which was instrumental in killing President Clinton’s health care plan in the early 1990s, has changed its view of the problem and is now a strong advocate for change. He said health-insurance markets are “fundamentally broken” and added, “The status quo is no longer sustainable.”

Small businesses can no longer cope with annual cost increases and fewer choices, he said. “The starting point must be cost, cost, cost,” he said. “If legislators don’t address cost, whatever else they do is not sustainable.”

Health care reform will be a major legislative goal throughout the spring and summer. President Obama has made it a priority in his budget, and the Democrat-controlled Congress is committed to act on it this year.

A key issue once again will be whether the plan that emerges includes an employer mandate to provide insurance to workers.

“We strongly oppose an employer mandate and will continue to oppose it,” the NFIB chief said. “It makes no sense to mandate something small businesses cannot afford. They will lay people off. It is a job killer.”

He did say that an employer mandate that exempts small businesses is “certainly a possibility” that NFIB could accept.

He also said NFIB would be open to limiting the amount of employer-provided health care benefits that could be excluded from income taxes.

Although Mr. Danner opposes a government-run health care system similar to Canada’s, he said he supports Mr. Obama’s goals that health care overhaul in this country should provide more choice, more competition and lower costs.

On the energy front, Mr. Danner said the NFIB has taken no position yet on a bill working its way through the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

“If it looks like the result is an enormous energy tax, then we would certainly oppose it,” he said.

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