Mike Enzi: “Folks all over the country are just like Jim. Insurance agents are explaining to small businesses that they will be…”

“Folks all over the country are just like Jim. Insurance agents are explaining to small businesses that they will be forced to choose either to absorb premium increases in excess of 15 percent or lose their grandfathered health plan status. By the administration's own estimate, up to 80 percent of small businesses will lose the right to keep what they have. Lots of companies pay 90 percent of the cost of their employees' and families' insurance. They were hoping to be grandfathered at least until 2014, to see exactly how damaging the whole bill would be. But we are experiencing 2014 now, with no help in cost cutting. The Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council says it pretty succinctly. In a letter they wrote to me supporting S.J. Res. 39, they write: Rather than helping small business owners and their workforce keep their plans, it appears the rule has been rigged to force most small businesses and their employers out of grandfathered status. The letter also reads: The rule, as written, is in clear violation of President Obama's promise that Americans would be able to keep the health plans they currently have upon passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.”