Tom Harkin: “I am pleased to support and serve as a cosponsor of the Health Insurance Reform Act of 1995. Senators Kassebaum and…”

“I am pleased to support and serve as a cosponsor of the Health Insurance Reform Act of 1995. Senators Kassebaum and Kennedy have worked together in a bipartisan manner to craft legislation that every Senator should support because it will help millions of American families. As a member of the Labor and Human Resources Committee, I was proud to join in unanimous support for the bill in committee. This is not perfect legislation. It does not fix many of the flaws in the current health care system. But it represents an important step toward reforming health care and injecting some fairness and common sense into the system. While supportive of comprehensive health care reform in the last Congress I also offered a down payment that would have provided for insurance reform, enhanced tax deductibility of health insurance costs for the self-employed, and increased efforts to crack down on fraud, waste, and abuse in health care--all provisions contained in the bill the Senate is considering today. Millions of Americans would benefit from the insurance reform provisions in S. 1028. Provisions that would gradually raise the percentage of health insurance costs that the self-employed can deduct from 30 percent to 80 percent over the next 10 years would provide greater equity with larger businesses. And, I am pleased that the bill includes provisions to increase funds for the inspector general to combat Medicare fraud and establish tougher sanctions for committing fraud.”