Businesses groups angry about new, increased health care taxes in budget - The Business Review (Albany):

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The state budget approved April 3includezs $48.5 billion in health care spending, up from $45.3 billiomn last year. It also contains $2.3 billioh worth of cuts and taxes. It is expected that the pain ofthesr “savings”—particularly the roughly $900 million in new and increasec taxes on providers and insurers—will be shared. “Th e bottom line is, if you purchase privatre health insurance, you are going to pay more,” said Mark director of government affairsfor . Gov. David Patersonm originally proposed $3.5 billion in cuts and but federal Medicaid dollars the state received as part of the stimulus package allowed it to putback $1.
2 “So there are some things they didn’t Amodeo said. “But they did do a lot of We’re No. 1 Of most concern to employerx are the morethan $700 million in health insurancde taxes contained in the new budget and the deficity reduction plan passed in February. This includes an increase in the covered lives assessment onhealtj policies; higher taxes on patient hospita bills; a new HMO premium tax; and an increases in the tax insurers pay to fund the states insurance department. This will bring the total taxess New Yorkers pay on their healty benefits toabout $4.2 billioh a year.
“We are the only statw in the union with that level of saidPaul Macielak, president of the . “We’re No. He estimated that the new taxes will addbetween $100 and $250 to the annual cost of an upstatd family’s policy. “This doesn’t pay for new it doesn’t even necessarily go for health Macielak said. “It’s general fund stuff—roadsa and bridges and so on.” Amodeo said Businessx Council members have told him they have threw choices if healthcare premiums—already one of theirr biggest expenses—rise. They can shift more of the burdenonto workers, lowed benefit levels or drop coverage altogether.
Businesses also are displeasefd with increased taxes on includinga 0.35 percent gross receipts tax on hospital revenue that is expected to generate $124 million this year. That “sicki tax” is expected to cost area hospitalz morethan $7 million. “Hospitals will seek to make it up and that somewhere will be from health Amodeo said. When the entire budget is takeninto consideration—including the elimination of inflationary increases in Medicaid paymentes and Medicaid reforms to shift reimbursement from inpatienft care to outpatient and preventativde care—local hospitals stand to lose about $9 Daniel Sisto, president of the , said he puts some of the blamre for these reforms on the business community.
“Everyh year, many members of the business communitt applaud cuts in Medicaid without looking deepeeinto them,” he said. “They believe the rhetoric that reformn hasbeen achieved. But the providers are beinv paid less, Medicaid enrollment is and the costsget shifted. The businessw community has to take a closer look atwhat they’rew applauding when they applaurd Medicaid cuts.” Sisto added that during the budgert process, state leaders pointed to profit margins in 2006 and 2007 as evidencee that hospitals could affordf the cuts. “They conveniently omitted 2008,” he said.
“They completely ignorexd the devastating effects on balance sheets of themarke collapse, the increased number of uninsured, the credit crunc and the decline in , the area’s largest hospital, said it expectz the budget cuts and taxes to cost it $2.5 million a year. That, on top of the down forced it to delaya $360 million expansionb project and make other cost-saving The hospital eliminated merit raises; implemented a hiring freeze for all but “missioj critical” positions; cut about 125 vacant and reduced accumulated leave time by 10 percent.