Custom Health Option and Individual Care Expense Arrangement Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. SMUCKER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 3799.

The comments by Mr. Doggett and others would make you think it is an entirely different bill. There is nothing in this bill that would change coverage for preexisting conditions. I don't know what he is talking about with icky because more people will have healthcare available to them as a result of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I serve on two committees that have crafted pieces of this legislation, the Ways and Means Committee and the Education and the Workforce Committee. I think that all of us--and I think this is probably shared on both sides of the aisle--want all Americans to have access to the healthcare and to the insurance that they choose for themselves. As I said, I think we share that.

Certainly, as a small business owner myself, I can relate to businessowners who want to ensure that their employees, their team members have access to the healthcare. They want them to be healthy; they want them to go home from work healthy; and they are very interested in ensuring that their employees have affordable coverage.

This committee focused on expanding the CHOICE arrangements, which is a system that will provide numerous benefits for employees and small businesses because it lets job creators offer their workers cash to purchase individual health plans, which will help by ensuring that if workers move from one job to another, they can take their health plan with them. They are more portable, so that is a great change that will help a lot of individuals.

On the Education and the Workforce Committee, we wrote legislation that expands association health plans, or AHPs, which enable employers and the self-employed to band together. I have heard from a lot of self-employed individuals in my community who are having trouble accessing health insurance that they prefer. This would allow them to band together across State lines to purchase health coverage for themselves and, in the case of small businesses, for their workers.

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Mr. SMUCKER. Mr. Chair, there is one other thing in this bill which I think is very positive. We took action to preserve self-insurance. This is a system in which large and small employers pay for healthcare services directly instead of purchasing plans with a large insurer, which leads to savings and leads to collaboration between employers and workers at their company to ensure better wellness approach to keep employees healthy and not be required to access healthcare costs. It helps the workers, and it saves costs across the board. Self-insurance is another part of this bill that we preserve, which I think is very great.

The bottom line is that American workers and businesses need affordable and flexible healthcare options. This package of bills achieves those goals, and I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.

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