A wide array of Democrats want to extend the healthcare protections that exist in the federal Family Medical Leave Act to the state’s older Oregon Family Leave Act, requiring employers to continue group insurance plans to employees who take unpaid leave under the Oregon law, just as they have always had to do under federal law.
House Bill 2600 would primarily affect smaller employers with 25 to 49 employees who are exempt from the federal law. Oregon’s law is generally much more liberal than the federal law -- while both laws generally protect unpaid leave for 12 weeks, under certain limited exceptions, Oregon’s law can be applied to 36 weeks. It also encompasses bereavement, and can be used during a medical emergency of additional family members in one’s care, including grandparents and grandchildren.
But the Oregon law has a big gap, too. If someone has an illness or injury that keeps them from work, and their employer has fewer than 50 employees, the employer can cancel their health insurance while the employee is away from work, despite the state law protecting their right to take unpaid leave.
“You could lose your group insurance while you’re out on family leave, which just seems wrong,” said Rep. Barbara Smith Warner, D-Portland, the chief sponsor of HB 2600. She is joined in support by 14 Democrats from across Oregon, including rural representatives like Rep. Brad Witt, D-Clatskanie.
Andrea Paluso, the co-founder of Family Forward Oregon, who is a chief advocate of the bill, framed HB 2600 as a technical fix to close this loophole and align the state law with the federal law. “This is the most important time for an employee to be able to continue health insurance,” she said.
Rep. Rob Nosse, D-Portland, said that in his experience as a labor representative for the Oregon Nurses Association that employers affected by the federal law pay both the employer and the employee share of the health insurance premium while the employee is away from work. When the employee returns to the job and can draw wages, that person is then required to repay their employer for the health premiums.
Paluso pointed out that the idea for HB 2600 came out of a work group organized by Associated Oregon Industries, the powerful conservative business group.
But Associated Oregon Industries lobbyist Betsy Earls was quick to state that the legislation was not her conservative business group’s idea, in fact, its leaders are adamantly opposed to HB 2600.
“It’s only a technical fix if you’re not the employer who has to pay the bill while you’re employee is off on family leave,” Earls said. “This is a bill that will cost a fair amount of money for employers.”
If nothing else, the discussion over HB 2600 cast an unflattering light on America’s irrational healthcare system, in which some employers can cut off people’s insurance coverage when they’re sick, and other employers are burdened paying the insurance premiums for people who are not working. The United States is the only country in the world that chooses to tie healthcare coverage to employment. In other countries, a universal healthcare system is funded through some sort of taxing mechanism.
Tricia Smith, a lobbyist for the Oregon School Employees Association, a union that represents lunch ladies, janitors, bus drivers and other non-professional school employees, seemed appalled at Earls’ opposition, and mentioned that she had been involved with the formation of Oregon’s law more than two decades ago:
“We would have included this if it had occurred to us that an employer would cancel an employee’s health insurance while they are out on medical leave.”
