Employee Groups Still Examining Health Care Reform

The health care reform bill passed by the House over the weekend is certainly not the most radical change to the American health care system that could have passed. But it's a very big bill, with very big implications. And the federal employee groups I've talked to are still studying it carefully. The consensus so far has settled around the excise tax. Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees, speaks for most of the employee groups I've spoken with when she says "While we oppose any excise tax, the provisions of H.R. 4872 are much better than H.R. 3590 and we will urge the Senate to pass them." Those provisions she's referring to would raise the threshold plans' prices would have to meet to be subject to the tax.

That calculation is important and impactful for feds, at least it will be in 2018, when the tax goes into effect. Short term, the story I'm most interested in though, is what happens to the Office of Personnel Management now, as it prepares to take up its new responsibilities.