Nydia M. Velazquez: “Today, we should be focusing on helping small businesses address the health care problems they face. Instead, our debate…”

“Today, we should be focusing on helping small businesses address the health care problems they face. Instead, our debate is not about policy but about politics. The House has already passed this once, and it is a bit early for summer reruns. It is a good bill with broad bipartisan support. Passing it twice will not change that. As we move forward, small businesses are facing a real health care crisis. Small firms that can afford health insurance are seeing costs rise by nearly 20 percent every single year, and many small businesses do not even have health insurance. This is a good bill. It has strong solvency requirements and safeguards to ensure there will be no cherrypicking of healthy employees. Critics of this legislation will cite an outdated study that examines legislation far different than the bill before us today. This has the same validity as saying Columbus should never have sailed to the New World because previous studies had shown the world was flat. Association health plans will give small businesses the same advantages that corporate America and unions already have. I always say, if it is good enough for IBM, GM, and Lockheed Martin, it is good enough for small businesses. But we should stop playing politics with small business. If the Bush administration was truly committed to small businesses, association health plans would already be law.”