According to Connecticut’s Office of Health Care Access, most Connecticut residents have health insurance. Approximately six percent of our population is uninsured. However, most of the uninsured are adults who are working – approximately sixty-one percent. Within this group, nearly two-thirds of working uninsured persons are employed by companies that do not offer health care, and almost half of these individuals work for Connecticut’s smallest employers.

This data leads me to believe that a major cause of this problem is that healthcare is too expensive for many businesses, and especially our smallest businesses, to offer to their employees. Therefore, one important solution to this problem is to make employer-based health insurance more affordable.

One way we can do this is through our tax policy. This year, I proposed legislation that would permit small businesses to receive a tax credit for fifty percent of the cost of providing health insurance to their employees. This tax credit would apply to small businesses that are created as limited liability companies, partnerships, and other similar so-called “pass through” entities. This is a significant point because most of our small businesses are not corporations. Rather, they are typically created in one of these other forms. Connecticut policy makers have taken the position over the years that tax credits should not be available to businesses other than corporations. I disagree because that has the effect of preventing many small businesses from benefiting from tax credits. My legislation would help small businesses provide health insurance to their employees by making it more affordable – through the use of tax credits – for them to do so. By changing the economics of this situation, I believe that we can increase the number of individuals who can obtain healthcare through their employers.

Tax policy can also be used to create incentives for healthy decision making. Members of the Senate Republican Caucus are calling for the creation of a Healthy Living Tax Break. Under this legislative proposal, individuals who meet preventive care guidelines established by the Department of Public Health would be able to deduct out of pocket medical expenses such as premiums, deductibles and co-pays, from their state income tax. Physicians would be asked to sign certification forms stating that their patients had all the annual and semi-annual preventive care screenings recommended for their age and gender. Patients seeking healthy living tax breaks would include these signed and completed forms with their state income tax filings. Providing people with a financial incentive to obtain preventive care would lead to a healthier population and, ultimately, lower health care costs.

As with so many issues we deal with in the legislature, the issue of healthcare presents fundamentally different choices for addressing the problems we face in this area. I recognize that there are many different ways that we can tackle this problem. However, I believe that government providing healthcare for people is not the best option for our state. A better approach is to implement policies that make healthcare more affordable to obtain and encourage people to make healthy decisions when it comes to their own care and well-being. These are the types of policies that I am pursuing as your State Senator.

I hope you have found this column interesting and informative. I would like to hear your thoughts regarding Connecticut’s health care issues, or regarding any other issue important to our state. I can be reached at my legislative office in Hartford at 860-240-8800, or via e-mail at Sam.Caligiuri@cga.ct.gov.