The Honorable Frank Guinta
326 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Representative Guinta,
On behalf of the ERISA Industry Committee (ERIC), thank you for introducing H.R. 879, the ‘‘Ax the Tax on Middle Class Americans’ Health Plans Act.’’ This legislation would relieve employers of the almost unbelievable burden, both financial and administrative, of compliance with the Affordable Care Act’s 40% excise tax on health coverage. This bill is critically important to large employers, and we fully support it.
ERIC is the only national trade association advocating solely for the employee benefit and compensation interests of America’s largest employers. ERIC has a strong interest in proposals that affect its members’ ability to deliver cost-effective benefits to millions of workers and their families, such as your extremely helpful legislation.
Rising costs have made it more and more difficult for ERIC members to continue to deliver highquality benefits to their employees. The addition of a 40% excise tax to these spiraling health care costs only adds to the growing burden on large employers. Besides the tax itself, the unparalleled complexity of computing the tax will impose a set of administrative challenges to employers that is almost unprecedented.
The employer community has never been tasked with an undertaking as significant as that imposed by the excise tax, and we are concerned at the harm this tax could impose on the one sector of the health care system that continues to offer high-quality, cost-efficient health care benefits to millions of Americans.
We applaud your efforts, and we look forward to working with you to ensure that this bill becomes law. Thank you again for sponsoring this legislation.
Sincerely,
Annette Guarisco Fildes
President and CEO