HR Policy Urges Congress to Strengthen ERISA and Preserve its Preemption Provisions

HR Policy submitted comments to the House Education and Workforce request for information on ways to preserve and strengthen ERISA. The Committee requested feedback on ways they can build upon and strengthen ERISA ahead of the legislation’s 50^th anniversary this fall.

Why it matters: Our comments reiterated the importance of ERISA’s preemption provisions in enabling businesses to offer uniform, tailored, and high-quality benefits to their employees across the country. The comments noted, “Effective implementation and administration of these benefits is only possible because of the national framework provided by ERISA. Without this framework, employers would be subject to a patchwork of state requirements, making it increasingly difficult to design and uniformly administer health, welfare, and retirement benefits for employees and families.”

National framework allows innovation. HR Policy reiterated the importance of the national framework provided by ERISA during the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to this framework, employers were able to quickly implement crucial health care services, like telehealth, nationally. The comments urged the Committee to “reject any attempts to weaken the federal restriction on state-by-state regulation of self-insured employers.”

The comments also provided recommendations related to:

• Transparency and data sharing: To address rising health care costs, HR Policy urged the Committee to require robust and complete health care data reporting to self-insured plan fiduciaries. This includes PBM reporting containing information on fees, rebates, and other revenue PBMs receive from drug manufacturers and other third-parties.
• Electronic delivery of plan communications: Under current ERISA regulation, health and welfare plans are required to print and mail communications to beneficiaries. HR Policy requested the Committee to continue its work with the Tri-Agencies to prioritize rulemaking that would enable ERISA plans to use e-delivery as a default means of providing plan communications.
• Prohibited transactions: HR Policy recommended Congress prohibit the use of anti-competitive contract terms when contracting with health care providers. “These contract provisions can significantly limit employer plan innovation and flexibility that employers need to promote access to high-quality, lower-cost health care.”