Employers Convinced Mandate is Dead

Here we go again.

In an event about as frequent as a bipartisan vote, employers are apparently on the same page as their employees.  

They’re convinced the Supreme Court will toss out the individual mandate later this month while letting other provisions stand. This is according to the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans’ Supreme Court Affordable Care Act survey.

According to a press release, IFEBP surveyed  plan administrators, trustees and organizational representatives from single-employers/corporations, multiemployer trust funds and public/governmental employers in early May and received more than 1,000 responses. The survey covered a wide range of organizations across the country.  

A full two-thirds of those surveyed asserted the mandate would simply be struck down – keeping other parts of the law intact. Everyone else either thought it would all be scrapped or saved. The split was nearly even.

Brenda Hoffman, public relations associate for IFEBP, said in an email that the survey did not outright ask whether these responding employers were for or against health care reform in its entirety.

“The survey did ask which specific provisions employers would like to see remain, but did not ask the blanket statement of ‘as an employer are you for or against health care reform’?” Hoffman said. But the survey shows more than half (58 percent) believe the only positive financial outcome for them is if the entire health care law is overturned. At this point, however, close to half responded that they’re in a “wait and see” mode.

Two of the most popular aspects of the law? Extending coverage of adult children to the age of 26 and the elimination of pre-existing condition exclusions, of course.