Section 1 Short title
This Act may be cited as the “Freeing Americans from Inequitable Requirements Act of 2015” or the “FAIR Act of 2015” .
Freeing Americans from Inequitable Requirements Act of 2015
A BILL
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide that the individual health insurance mandate not apply until the employer health insurance mandate is enforced without exceptions.
Sec. 2 Findings; purpose
Findings— Congress finds the following:
Since the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (hereafter referred to as “PPACA”), the Administration—through the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of the Treasury—has unilaterally delayed or changed PPACA at least 20 times.
On July 2, 2013, the Administration delayed until 2015 the PPACA requirement that employers with at least 50 full-time equivalent employees provide health coverage for their full-time workers or risk paying a penalty to the Internal Revenue Service.
On February 10, 2014, the Administration once again delayed the PPACA requirement until 2016 for employers with between 50 and 99 full-time equivalent employees to provide qualified health insurance to their employees.
The Administration lacks the authority to unilaterally change statutorily defined dates in order to delay the implementation of any provision of PPACA.
If the Administration continues to suspend the penalties for businesses absent any statutory authority, then the penalties for all Americans should be suspended on the basis of fundamental fairness.
Purpose— The purpose of this Act is to require the suspension of the enforcement of penalties associated with the individual mandate should the Administration unilaterally announce a suspension of the enforcement of penalties for any component of the employer mandate.
Sec. 3 Individual health insurance mandate delayed until employer health insurance mandate enforced without exceptions
In general— Section 5000A of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 is amended by adding at the end the following new subsection:
“(h) Delay until employer health insurance mandate enforced without exceptions—This section shall not apply with respect to any month which begins before the date on which the Secretary submits to Congress a certification that section 4980H is being applied and administered without any administratively created exceptions.”
Effective date— The amendment made by this section shall apply to months beginning after December 31, 2014.