Legislative Priorities-Health Care Reform

ISSUE: Advocate for Consumer-Driven Reforms Resulting in Affordable Health Care Options Provided Through Private Insurance

CHAMBER MEMBERS ADVOCATE:

Supporting state and federal efforts that enable employers to provide cost-effective health care benefits and expand flexibility, competition and choice in the marketplace while developing competitive alternatives for individually-owned and consumer-driven health coverage.
Opposing healthcare mandates and policy changes that ignore the important role of the free market, especially in the area of benefit plan design.
Supporting employers’ rights to provide health care coverage for their employees while opposing efforts to penalize job providers who do not.
Encouraging personal responsibility for health by promoting wellness, prevention and chronic disease management programs.
Supporting meaningful efforts to promote transparency in the health care marketplace by supporting efforts to promote the disclosure of cost and quality data in order to educate consumers about the cost and effectiveness of treatment options, and the performance of health care providers so they can make well-informed health care decisions.
Opposing cost-shifting by Medicaid and Medicare to the private sector by ensuring appropriate payment by government entities and programs in a manner that promotes quality and efficiency.
Supporting the Certification of Need (CON) program and Commission to the extent that it benefits consumers, providers and purchasers of health services with affordability, accessibility and quality.

WHY?

True health care cost containment cannot be achieved if the focus is on price controls and government interference in health care purchasing decisions. Rules and regulations already on the books have driven up costs and reduced choices; more of the same kind of regulation will only produce more of the same result. Instead, policymakers should focus on implementing market-friendly, consumer-driven reforms and the elimination of regulations increasing employer and employees’ costs and adding to the number of uninsured individuals statewide.