Maryland Lawmaker Backs ‘Wal-Mart Bill’ for Small Businesses

By Karen Buckelew

The rest of the camel has arrived.That’s what business advocates are saying of just-proposed legislation that would extend to small employers the same payroll tax provisions included in the so-called Wal-Mart bill passed last year.Del. James W. Hubbard, a Prince George’s County Democrat, is sponsoring House Bill 1510, a 50-page behemoth encompassing multiple health-related proposals. Among other things, the bill would require businesses with fewer than 10,000 employees to provide health insurance at 4.5 percent of their payroll for for-profit employers and 3 percent of the payroll for nonprofits.Last year’s Wal-Mart legislation laid the groundwork for this year’s proposal. If passed, all employers in the state would be required to provide health insurance for employees, despite the rising costs of health care, said the legislation’s opponents.Last year, the Maryland Chamber [of Commerce] predicted that the Wal- Mart bill was the camel’s nose under the tent that would lead to future legislation extending the tax to all employers, said chamber Vice President of Government Affairs Ronald W. Wineholt. This bill is the rest of the camel.The legislation has not been scheduled for a hearing.The Wal-Mart bill required employers with more than 10,000 workers to either put 8 percent of their total payroll toward health care or pay the state of Maryland the difference between what they spend on health care and that 8 percent total.The new bill – the latest incarnation of legislation Hubbard has introduced for many consecutive years on behalf of the Baltimore-based Maryland Citizens Health Initiative – has the same provisions, and also would make small businesses that comply eligible for $15 million in grants.The $15 million, explained Maryland Citizens Health Initiative President Vincent DeMarco, would come from an additional $1 tax on tobacco products proposed in HB 441, set for a hearing this afternoon.The legislation would ensure health care for all employed Marylanders – the goal of DeMarco’s coalition – and would level the playing field, especially among small businesses, DeMarco said.Some small businesses, he explained, try to keep pay as high as possible to remain competitive in attracting employees, forsaking health benefits. But if all employers had to offer health care, he said, that situation would change.That’s not to mention, DeMarco added, the fact that the tab of caring for the uninsured falls into the laps of the insured in the form of higher insurance premiums, Medicaid expenses and the like.You’re in effect subsidizing everyone else, DeMarco said. Most employers provide good health care benefits for their employees – but they don’t want to subsidize those that don’t.Small business advocates, however, said the legislation would require employers to spend more money on health care they already struggle to afford. The solution is not more mandates – like the health maintenance organization premium tax the state’s insurers have passed on to beneficiaries – but controlling rising health care costs, according to Ellen Valentino, director of the Maryland chapter of the National Federation of Independent Business.We need to refocus back on affordability and not on new taxes, said Valentino. The proponents of this bill – their agenda is clear. They want to establish a government-run health care system that is funded by taxes on the small-business community.Both Valentino and Wineholt of the chamber of commerce vowed their organizations would fight the legislation with as much vigor as they fought the Wal-Mart bill, which currently is the subject of a lawsuit filed in federal court against the state of Maryland.Most businesses are doing the best they can to insure their employees, agreed both DeMarco and the proposal’s opponents. But they differ on the solution to the issue of the uninsured.Most employers today provide health insurance because it’s an important competitive benefit to provide, Wineholt said. The reason that some employers – mainly small employers – don’t provide health insurance is because they can’t afford to. This bill doesn’t make it any more affordable.