Senate Finance Committee Panel Votes in Favor of Baucus Plan
BY LAUREN UZDIENSKI, OCTOBER 13, 2009
A Senate Finance Committee panel voted 14-9 today in favor of healthcare reform legislation. Senator Olympia Snowe was the only Republican on the panel to support the bill, which will proceed to a chamber-wide floor debate later this month. While Senator Snowe's vote lends the bill an aura of bipartisanship, she cautioned that her vote today did not mean she would vote for the bill in the future.
In the medical device industry, the bill has been criticized for a $40 billion tax that will be levied on companies by market share. Last week, fourteen Democratic senators signed a letter opposing the tax, noting that the fees could cost jobs, slow innovation and deny patients access to new technologies. Additionally, the governors of Utah, California, Nevada, Indiana and Minnesota have all voiced concerns about the tax.
The bill circulated to the panel today is far from final. In addition to whatever modifications are made in the next few weeks, certain details of the plan are still being worked out, and the bill will ultimately have to be reconciled with another Senate bill that was passed in July. In the meantime, the device industry will continue to lobby to reduce the tax burden. AdvaMed was rumored to have counter-offered $15 billion in fees last week, which Senator Baucus reportedly said was too low; negotiations are ongoing, and the opposition to the tax remains vocal.
