(Un)Healthy Bill of Fare

NEA Today, Feb 2004

Think the new Medicare law only concerns gramps and granny?

Guess again. The 678-page law signed by President Bush in December is bad medicine for anyone who relies upon employerprovided comprehensive health insurance. Most of the headlines about the NEAopposed bill focused on the prescription drug provision for seniors, which doesn't even go into effect until 2006 and already has been attacked as inadequate in the face of increasing drug costs (up 17 percent last year).

But it's not just those on Medicare who stand to lose. An obscure provision in the law providing for Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) could cause premiums for comprehensive health insurance to more than double, warns the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington think tank.

Here's why. The new HSAs, which allow employees to put aside money tax-free to pay for qualifying medical expenses, will appeal primarily to healthier and wealthier employees: they won't lose much (since they're not using many health services now), and they gain a tax break. But pulling healthier employees out of comprehensive plans hurts those who remain because they're likely to be hit with higher out-of-pocket charges.

That's hardly the only flaw in the new law.

The bill also provides for a risky experiment to privatize Medicare services, and Congressional negotiators ignored an NEA-endorsed provision, passed by the Senate, that would have protected benefits for preMedicare retirees.

What to do? Oregon Education Association-Retired member Jerry Wilkins says think voting booth. "For those who pushed this [bill] through'," he says, "there will be payback come election time." For more on why the Medicare law is bad medicine for you, go to www.nea.org/retired.>