On the recordJuly 25, 2018
I want to thank the gentleman from Illinois for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to support H.R. 6311, and more specifically, I rise to support bipartisan language to make flexible spending accounts flexible. While 44 percent of Americans have access to flexible spending accounts, flexible spending accounts have not been flexible. There are two problems: Under ObamaCare, flexible spending account contributions were capped at $2,650. And while the average American spends more than $5,700 in out-of-pocket healthcare costs, it is just not enough. The second problem is flexible spending account rules make people use it or lose it at the end of the year, and they can't roll over their money. They have to spend it on things they don't need or they have to lose that money. Our bipartisan solution solves those problems by doing two things: First, it increases the limit on FSA accounts by a multiple of three to $7,950. And I did the math for the ranking member. That total would be, over 3 years, if you wanted to save $50 a week, you could accumulate $7,950. Obviously, that would be if you weren't using it, so it would probably take longer than that to accumulate that kind of money. But, again, that is well over the average of $5,700 of out-of- pocket expenses that the average American has.…
