Does anybody like Amendment 56?
September 24th, 2008 | by Brian Schwartz |So asks a headline of an article by Bob Mook in last week’s Denver Business Journal. The proposed Amendment to the Colorado constitution would make it a crime for employers of twenty or more people not to buy them insurance. Here are some excerpts, but I recommend the whole article:
Mention Amendment No. 56 on the Nov. 4 ballot and you’ll get a universal, vitriolic response from business people who’ve studied the proposal. …
Even Amendment 56’s union-affiliated supporters seem reluctant to defend the ballot issue. Representatives for the campaign that supports the amendment declined to comment for this article. …
But [attorney Doug] Friednash and others contend that Amendment 56 and other union-backed measures weren’t written to correct deficient public policy, they were assembled as a “nuclear option” to force business interests to withdraw support of Amendment 47, the proposed “right-to-work” amendment, also on the November election ballot. …
For more on this, see here.
Amendment 56 critics say its ramifications are disastrous. Among their many concerns:
tags: colorado amendment 56, unions
- The amendment might force small businesses with 20 or more employees to lay off workers, and stop hiring or freeze wages to comply with the letter of the law.
- Companies with more than 20 employees would spin off into smaller subdivisions to avoid meeting the requirements imposed by Amendment 56.
- Employers who already offer health insurance to their employees might consider plans with higher deductibles and co-payments to meet the new standards and to control the ever-rising cost of providing insurance.
- Businesses would rely on contract labor instead of salaried employees because they’re not required to provide coverage for them.
- Amendment 56 makes no delineation between full- and part-time workers, and could hurt restaurants and retailers who rely on part-time workers.
- While proponents say the amendment is intended to give more people access to health coverage, the number of uninsured or underinsured residents actually could increase under Amendment 56 if the ranks of independent contractors and the unemployed increases.
- Approval of Amendment 56 could increase reliance on government-sponsored health plans such as Medicaid, which the state already struggles to fund.
- State legislators may define “major medical health care coverage” in terms that could drive up premium costs even more.
- Employers with more than 20 workers who decline to provide insurance would be required to pay into a government authority created by legislators that will provide coverage. It’s unclear how the authority would collect money.
- Even if the courts ultimately overturn Amendment 56, voter approval of it could generate nationwide publicity that would tell out-of-state companies that Colorado isn’t a “business-friendly” environment.
