Judge Tauro of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts issued an interesting opinion this week as to the power, if any, of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination to continue to investigate whether an employer, in this instance Partners Healthcare Systems – which operates major teaching hospitals, among other operations – violates
Preemption
The Massachusetts Health Care Reform Act and the Purposes of Preemption
By Stephen Rosenberg on
I have been meaning to come back to some issues concerning the Massachusetts Health Care Reform Act, the state’s potentially groundbreaking attempt to combine individual, employer and government roles to provide health insurance coverage for most of the Commonwealth’s uninsured, and now seems like a good time to do so, with its effective date coming…
ERISA Preemption and Universal Health Care in Massachusetts
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Posted in Preemption
Well, the world of ERISA preemption, without Maryland’s Wal-Mart law to focus on anymore, turns its lonely eyes to Massachusetts’ universal health insurance statute, with the Boston Business Journal posting a front page article this week that says, in essence, it might be preempted but then again, maybe not.
Whether or not this statute is…
Preemption and Health Insurance Benefits
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Posted in Health Insurance, Preemption
Maryland has given up the fight over its Wal-Mart bill, which essentially targeted Wal-Mart and tried to force it to increase the health care benefits provided to its employees; as many of you will recall, the Fourth Circuit and the district court both found the act to be preempted by ERISA. Most commentators, including this…
Equitable Relief Under ERISA in the First Circuit Post-Sereboff
By Stephen Rosenberg on
The district courts in the First Circuit have been so busy issuing ERISA related decisions recently that it has become difficult to find time to post on other things that I also want to talk about. That said, however, the District Court for the District of Maine just issued a remarkable opinion that I both…
Insurance Brokers as ERISA Defendants
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Roy Harmon, over at his Health Plan Law blog, has his typically scholarly take on two recent rulings out of the United States District Court for the District of New Hampshire in the case of Hopper v. Standard Insurance Company. The rulings primarily revolve around the question of which claims in the lawsuit…
ERISA, Interpleader and Qualified Domestic Relations Orders
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Recently, waiting for a pretrial conference in federal court on one of my cases, I listened as a judge explained to the lawyers in a different case, based on only knowing the causes of action, what the actual facts of the case before him must be, even though he had never heard from the parties before. He…
Wal-Mart and Preemption
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Posted in Preemption
It is likely that if you are interested in the subject of this blog you already know that the Fourth Circuit has now affirmed the District Court decision striking down Maryland’s Fair Share Act. Workplace prof has a nice post summing up the issue here, and major media accounts can be found here and here. …
Mandated Health Benefits and Preemption in San Francisco
By Stephen Rosenberg on
Posted in Preemption
Here is a neat post about the latest skirmish over state or local attempts to mandate health benefits and whether doing so is preempted by ERISA, this time in San Francisco, where an organization representing restaurant owners is challenging a city ordinance mandating the provision of health benefits. This is echoes of the Maryland Fair…
Employee Welfare Benefit Plans and the Small Employer
Preemption is a tough defense to get around, particularly in the First Circuit, where it is taken quite seriously and numerous decisions expressly declare particular state law causes of action to be preempted by ERISA. One clever response to this problem, at least when the facts will allow the argument, is to try to sidestep…