As was published in the national media recently, the White House announced a one-year delay in implementation of the employer mandate that requires employers with greater than 50 employees to pay for health insurance or face a penalty. MRAA worked during the drafting of the Affordable Care Act to exempt employers with fewer than 50 employees from the mandate, which MRAA thought would exempt most marine retailers.

In a letter to the White House, Republicans demanded answers why businesses are off the hook but the rest of America is not. House leadership on July 9 seized on the Administration’s one-year delay of the requirement that employers offer health insurance or face penalties by demanding the same postponement for the mandate on individual insurance purchases and promised a series of showdowns.

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) clearly took aim at the individual mandate by saying, “each provision you delay continues to demonstrate that the entire law is unworkable.” Rumors in DC indicate troubles in the Department of Health and Human Services in writing the rules and regulations needed to implement Obamacare.

– Larry Innis, Legislative Affairs