The following comments were made by Christine Romer, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, a smart person with no apparent employee benefits street smarts or union savvy. She was commenting on the new tax that will be applied to so called Cadillac plans under the PPACA. I found the comments on this blog:
Part of the idea of how that is going to work is precisely because it does empower consumers. It empowers each of us to have an employer-sponsored plan to call our HR office and say, ‘Would you negotiate harder? Would you think about (whether this) is the most efficient plan out there, because I don’t want my plan paying an excise tax.’ So I think that’s something that is very much empowering consumers.
[picapp align=”none” wrap=”false” link=”term=christine+romer&iid=8657709″ src=”4/6/a/5/Biden_Chairs_Recovery_7da1.jpg?adImageId=12704673&imageId=8657709″ width=”380″ height=”570″ /]
Read my lips, employees want to be empowered
Let’s think about this statement, it says that employees will call their company and ask the company to lower their benefits, that is raise their deductible, raise co-payments, or simply eliminate certain benefits. Negotiate harder, what the heck does that mean? Does Christine Romer think that employers pay high health care costs for the fun of it and that they are so stupid as to pay claims without question? Does she realize that most of these plans, if not all, are self insured and thus the only thing to negotiate is the administrative fee? Does she realized that many, perhaps most of so-called Cadillac plans are union plans many with state governments? Most efficient plan?
Hello, is the this the employee benefits office? Are you sure my health benefits are the most efficient possible? What do you mean efficient for who? For the Company? I mean just efficient, period. You think it would be more efficient and I would be a better consumer if there were a high deductible health plan? What’s that? The annual out of pocket cost for me and my family is $11,900? That’s what they mean by me being empowered, eh, can I get back to you on that?
One has to wonder whether smart people are really smart or do they just check their brains at the door of the White House?
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 