What You Need to Know

• The HIT will make health care more expensive in the midst of a pandemic – right when people need the safety net provided by their coverage.
• When health insurance costs increase, there is always an economic impact. With less money to invest, local Connecticut businesses will have a harder time growing their business and the state economy, and may decide not to purchase health insurance for employees.
• While the tax is being marketed as a way to expand affordable coverage, in reality, it will do the exact opposite – raising costs for working class individuals, families and local business owners.
• The HIT will increase costs by $480 for the average working-class family in Connecticut who gets their coverage through a local business which is on top of the almost $700 Connecticut consumers already pay annually in taxes on their health insurance coverage.
• This new additional tax does nothing but add to the cost of health care, rather than addressing the true drivers of high health care costs – like rising prescription drug costs.
• Congress repealed the federal Health Insurance Tax (HIT) because of the broadly recognized impact – more than $500 annually per employee covered by a family plan – on local businesses and consumers.
• When Congress repealed the federal HIT, it was Connecticut workers and families who saw the relief in no longer having to pay the tax as part of their annual insurance coverage.
• Connecticut taxpayers and voters have a right to know that the proposed state HIT tax will increase costs for any local business, their employees and their families, just as the federal HIT did before it was repealed.
• State politicians are deflecting attention away from the uncomfortable truth that this state HIT tax proposal will increase costs for hard working families and workers, at a time when Connecticut is in a budget surplus and an additional $10 billion is coming to the state in federal stimulus aid passed by President Biden and Democrats in Congress.