The Human Resource

Ways & Means Committee approves HSA HOPE Act of 2006

The House Ways and Means Committee approved this afternoon a bill to improve Health Savings Accounts. The action follows a hearing the committee had in late June (see ECFC Bulletin 2006-12). A summary of the measure, a substitute version of H.R. 6134, offered by committee chairman Bill Thomas (R-CA) for the original bill sponsored by Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) can be reviewed at http://gbac.com/Editor/assets/HSA

The committee approved the bill with all Republicans supporting it and all Democrats opposed.

The future of the measure in this Congress is up in the air. Congress is scheduled to recess at the end of this week. It will return for a short post-election session in November. In the Senate, the Senate Finance Health Subcommittee conducted a hearing yesterday on a similar bill, S. 3585, sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, (R-UT). However, there are no current plans in the Senate for action on that measure. Nonetheless, it seems certain that today’s approval of an HSA bill by the House Ways and Means Committee will spur further action on consumer-direction health issues in the next Congress, which convenes in January.

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