Tom Reed Calls HR 3962 A "Nightmare"; Urges Congressman Massa to Oppose Plan

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

After spending the weekend reading through the nearly two thousand pages of HR 3962, the misnamed "Affordable Health Care for America Act," 29th District Congressional candidate Tom Reed pronounced the plan "a nightmare" and urged Congressman Eric J.J. Massa to oppose it.

"This bill is the most convoluted thing I have ever seen," Reed said. "This will create an astounding amount of bureaucracy. It leaves interpretation in the hands of a new Health Benefits Advisory Committee which will need tens of thousands of pages of regulation to do its work of making decisions for people.

"People should be able to work with their doctors, not a government board, to determine what treatment is necessary for them and when," Reed said.

Reed cited a recent Wall Street Journal editorial that noted HR 3962 would impose $572 billion in new taxes, including some on families making less than $250,000 per year. The Wall Street Journal described the proposed health plan as a "runaway train" that would become a permanent entitlement whose cost would balloon to more than two trillion dollars.

"The biggest concern I hear on a daily basis all over Western New York is jobs," Reed said. "This proposal imposes massive new costs on employers. This bill will lower wages and destroy jobs in Western New York, and I urge Eric Massa to oppose it immediately and vigorously."

Reed noted that the proposed bill does include steps in the right direction in terms of interstate insurance competition and amending the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, but that it does not include tort reform, which is one the major factors driving up the current health care costs.

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