Press Releases

The House Education and the Workforce Committee today convened its first hearing to investigate ObamaCare and its consequences for the American workforce and economy.

“A proposal designed to reduce health care costs will instead increase national health care spending by $311 billion,” said Chairman John Kline (R-MN). “During a time of stubbornly high unemployment, job creators are forced to wrestle with the uncertainty of what the law and its new regulations mean and how that all fits into their plans for the future.  Employers already struggling to keep their doors open now must choose between higher health care costs or costly penalties. To suggest this doesn’t undermine job creation is to deny reality.”

The committee heard from several witnesses who described the ways in which the Democrats’ government takeover of health care will increase costs for small businesses and hurt job growth.

Gail Johnson, a pediatric nurse and small business owner, expressed the need for health care reform but said of ObamaCare, “Increasing access to health coverage and forsaking measures to control health care costs will lead to negative repercussions in the small business community.” Mrs. Johnson went on to say, “The new health care reform law will slow or stall the growth of small and midsized businesses as we struggle to absorb its new costs.”

Mrs. Johnson also described how the employer mandate will not only drive up her business costs, but also the costs placed on her employees: “Under the new law, starting in 2014, we will be required to offer coverage or pay a tax penalty. To keep up with the law’s mandated essential benefits, we will have to increase the amount of employee cost-sharing. This will drive our health insurance costs higher than we are able to provide today.”

Neil Trautwein, representing the nation’s largest association of retail stores, described the challenges now facing retail businesses. “The penalty mandate provisions are already affecting hiring decisions in advance of their effective date in 2014,” said Trautwein. “We have heard reports from across the retail community (including our restaurant members) that the penalty mandates are affecting expansion, franchising and hiring decisions today. Retailers employ nearly 25 million workers, and they believe the law will have negative consequences for their workers as well.” As Trautwein stated, the Democrats’ health care law may “ultimately succeed in dismantling employer-based health coverage.”

The Democrats’ health care reform poses significant challenges to America’s businesses, and the economy as a whole. Dr. Paul Howard, senior fellow and director of the Center for Medical Progress at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, expressed during his testimony, “Unfortunately, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is not the solution to our health care woes.  If anything, the Affordable Care Act ‘doubles down’ on many of the worst aspects of our current system, while adding new cost pressures and problems that will serve as a drag on economic growth and job creation for years to come.”

Doubling down on a broken health care system is clearly bad for job-creators and the economy. That is why Republicans are engaged in a process to develop real health care solutions that lower costs, expand access to affordable care, and protect jobs.

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