October 12, 2007

Núñez on health care

Assembly Speaker Núñez had a press conference today at which he talked in detail about the chances for a compromise with the governor on health care. Among the the demands he said he still had:

-- He said he could support a sliding scale for the fee that employers would have to pay if they didn't provide health care for their workers, but he said that scale would have to slide at least up to the 7.5 percent that he required of all employers in his bill, AB 8. In the governor's plan, the fee slides from 1 percent to 4 percent depending on the size of the employer. Nunez said emphatically that he would not split the difference with the governor between Schwarzengger's 4 percent and his 7.5 percent.

-- He wants the employer fee to be "indexed" to health care inflation, so if health costs climb faster than wages, the employee fee would climb automatically to close the gap.

-- He said Schwarzenegger's proposed cap on premiums at 5 percent of an individual's income for those earning up to 350 percent of poverty was nice, but Núñez wants a cap of 5 percent of income on all health care costs, including not just premiums but deductibles, co-pays, drug costs and anything else that might come up.

-- He still opposes an individual mandate, but might support one if the subsidies covered people earning up to 450 percent of poverty, or more than $90,000 for a family of four. And it would have to include exemptions for people who, for whatever reason, still could not afford insurance.

-- He wants the state to buy drugs in bulk from the manufacturers and use its clout to demand discounts, which would be passed on to consumers.

If Núñez is serious about all this, it's very unlikely that there is going to be a deal. He said he really does not feel he should compromise further because his bill, AB 8, already represents a compromise between the governor's approach and single payer.

"Democrats support single payer," he said. "We want everybody to have health care as a right, not a privilege."

Posted by dweintraub on October 12, 2007 1:40 PM