Comité Insurance and Labor del Senado, 17 de marzo de 2026

Transcripción

99 turnos. Seleccione un tiempo para reproducir ese momento del video.

1. 0:20:58

   That's, that's up to how many questions you wanna ask. How about that?

2. 0:21:02

   Oh, yeah.

3. 0:21:02

   I'm doing that portion. All right, all right. All right, everybody. Thank you. The time has come and we have a quorum here as far as that. Uh, Senator Harbison, could you open us in a word of prayer-

4. 0:21:11

   Sure

5. 0:21:11

   ... if you will? What's your number there? You are number 14.

6. 0:21:15

   Thank you, Father. Thank you for the blessings for this day. Thank you for the gathering. Bless us with wisdom, honesty, and always understand that you are in charge, you're in control, but let us be mindful that we're working for all of the people of the state of Georgia. Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

7. 0:21:30

   Amen.

8. 0:21:30

   Amen.

9. 0:21:31

   Thank you, sir. Appreciate that. And I would say this, you are gonna be greatly missed. You have been a great benefit to the Senate, and I thank you for your service and for your friendship, and you are a true Southern gentleman.

10. 0:21:44

    Thanks.

11. 0:21:44

    And so we appreciate you in that respect. So I say that.

12. 0:21:47

    That gold coin you got in your pocket.

13. 0:21:49

    Ah, yes, sir. Yes, sir. Ah, yes. I'm gonna have to find one for you.

14. 0:21:54

    Listen. Thank you, sir. I appreciate it.

15. 0:21:57

    All right. Uh, only thing we have on the general we're gonna take is HB 987, which I believe is LC 520908. And I believe, yes sir, I've not seen you today, uh, m- Representative, I wanna make you Senator Todd Jones, but I'm gonna keep you as representative right now. If you'll come forward and tell us about your bill. And then we have also, it looks like you have brought along, uh, it looks like we've got three people who want to make comments about you or your bill. I don't know which one, but, uh, we'll let you tell us about it.

16. 0:22:29

    Is that fair?

17. 0:22:30

    Absolutely, Mr. Chairman. And if being a senator means I need to have the whip's white shoes, you know, I might have to think about it.

18. 0:22:37

    And a, and a tie, too, right. I, I... You gotta have a tie, too.

19. 0:22:40

    Yeah.

20. 0:22:43

    The floor is yours, sir.

21. 0:22:44

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. I bring to you House Bill 987, LC 520908. Um, this is a relatively straightforward 52 lines of a bill. Uh, what it is is the Portable Healthcare Bene- Benefits Act. Let me go ahead and walk you through what it exactly does. For the independent contractor, it creates a Staples Easy Button to allow them to be able to cordon off and allot a certain amount of money into a specified account so that they would be able to pay healthcare benefits, dental benefits, d- disability, et cetera.

22. 0:23:18

    So it gives them that opportunity to do that. So if you can imagine, if you are a gig worker, then you have the opportunity to tell the individual, the hiring entity that you're doing work with, to pay you $1,000, but in this case, it can be 750 to you, 250 to your benefits account. So effectively, it's a cordoned-off account for them. One of the things I should have mentioned right up front, 15 years ago, one in six Georgians were doing at least some type of 1099 work. Today, one in four Georgians are doing 1099 work, and that number is only increasing.

23. 0:23:49

    So this type of bill becomes more and more important for us as Georgians are taking in a sense their independent freedom and their financial capability and making it basically their own road to hold. On the second piece of this, the independent contractor gets the Staples Easy Button. But in addition to that, the hiring entity gets a surety that by participating in this, that that 1099 remains classified as a 1099. 'Cause one of the things that would, I guess w- we could say would halt a hiring entity from participating in this is, well, if I start doing that, will that reclassify the 1099 to a W-2?

24. 0:24:24

    And that's something that a lot of 1099s don't want. A lot of them want the independence, and the hiring entity wants to keep their mix of W-2s and 1099s. So this bill does three very important things. One, it keeps the independent contractor an independent contractor. N- number two, allows that independent contractor to c- create financial and budget accountability to create a benefits plan for themselves. And three, it assures the hiring entity that that individual will remain a 1099. Mr. Chairman, I'm happy to go through the bill, but I'm happy also to take questions, sir.

25. 0:24:53

    Could I ask one question-

26. 0:24:54

    Yes, sir

27. 0:24:55

    ... about the tax implications of this, of really the split that you're talking about? What are the implications of that, if you don't mind addressing that?

28. 0:25:02

    Yes, sir. Great question, and the good news is this bill does not touch the tax implications. So if you are just like anyone else today, if you're a 1099 and you are choosing to pay your health insurance benefits, well, there's federal treatment of that inside your Schedule C on the federal return, and then the same thing on your return to the State of Georgia. In other words, how you are doing this, why you're doing this, we do not touch the federal taxation or the state taxation. This is merely a way to give financial accountability to the 1099 and give assurance to the hiring entity that they're gonna remain a 1099.

29. 0:25:34

    Very good. We have a question from Senator Hodges. Please, sir, you are open to ask.

30. 0:25:40

    Thank, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think this is a great bill, Representative Jones. Just one question, though. Other than the presumption that paying benefits could make you an employer, is there anything in current law that proscribes us from doing this now?

31. 0:25:59

    So there's nothing in current law that would stop an independent contractor to frankly work with his or her, say, accountant, and say, "You know what? For every $1,000 I bring in, please put 250 into a dedicated account 'cause I plan to pay, uh, my ACA premium with that. I plan to pay my disability with that, and I plan to do my unemployment insurance with that." That exists today. Also, from a taxation point of view, from Senator Harbin's point of view, that all would exist today. What does not exist today is an ability to hit the Staples Easy Button. The ability of that contractor to enter into a voluntary contract, voluntary I wanna stress, they can, they must opt in with the hiring entity to say, "Put 750 into my operating account, 250 into my benefits account." That does not exist per se, and the reason why it does not exist is because the hiring entity today is most likely getting counsel from their general counsel saying, "If we do that, we risk going into the gray area of the classification that SCOTUS for so many years has basically dictated what makes a 1099 and what's makes an, an employee." I hope that helps, Senator.

32. 0:27:00

    It does.

33. 0:27:01

    Yes, sir.

34. 0:27:01

    Thank you very much.

35. 0:27:07

    Senator Kay

36. 0:27:09

    Thank you so much for the bill. Um, the more people have options for insurance, the better. The question that I have, I'm assuming that the income is, it's income they're already getting, and that's why there's no tax consequences. Is that correct?

37. 0:27:24

    Yeah, Senator, absolutely right. So a- again, I'll just use Uber as an example. If you're getting $1,000 a month from Uber, let's say you're averaging that, but you enter into a voluntary opt-in contract with Uber to bring seven fifty to, call it, your operating account and two fifty over, it's still your money. Now, that stated, to Senator Harbin's question, if you decide to move the two fifty, say, into healthcare benefits, depending on how you and accountant see it, most likely that's gonna be paid in pre-tax dollars versus post-tax dollars. But again, that's for treatment to be done downstream with the DOR and the IRS and your accountant.

38. 0:27:55

    Okay. And follow-up, Mr. Chair?

39. 0:27:57

    Yes, yes.

40. 0:27:57

    Um, so the worker is the one who sets up the account?

41. 0:28:03

    Yes, so-

42. 0:28:03

    The contracting entity doesn't have anything to do with setting it up?

43. 0:28:06

    No, the independent contractor, and you'll see, uh, regarding from lines twenty-two to line twenty-six, basically gives you that information. And that basically says that it's administered by a provider, which is defined in twenty-seven through thirty-one, but it is owned and controlled by the independent contractor. And one question that came out in the House, Senator Kirkpatrick, that I'll just voluntarily add, was, is there a vesting period or anything to that point? Absolutely not. This is the independent contractor's money. How the independent contractor decides to move that money is up to him or her, and then at that point, then it's his or her money.

44. 0:28:38

    So it's totally controlled and open by the independent contractor. The hiring entity through that contract, which is noted, my apologies for not memorizing the lines, which is noted starting in forty all the way down to forty-three, is basically laying out exactly the voluntary opt-in and then which account it would go into.

45. 0:28:59

    Very good. Senator Steele, you are on the phone.

46. 0:29:04

    Thank you, Mr. Chair, and, uh, I apologize for being late. Uh, got held up in a, uh, another committee. You know, it's amazing how these House committees just, uh, uh, love to load up, um, other bills. So, uh, if you know anything about that, sir, uh-

47. 0:29:19

    I wouldn't know anything about that, Senator

48. 0:29:21

    ... your best to praise. Um, a- asking this, uh, and, and I apologize if you already covered it. But in, in my employer experience with independent contractors, they might work forty hours one week, fifty hours the next, and then five the following. So when they've committed to a premium, I understand this has created the mechanism for them. But what happens, what's the, the mechanism if they lapse because they don't have the hours to pay their monthly premium?

49. 0:29:54

    So I wanna be clear, Senator Steele. This is the hiring entity, which I'll say your pool company is the hiring entity, and I'm a contractor to your pool company, sir. Um, if for some reason, w- well, we opt into a contract. Hypothetically, I say twenty-five percent should go into my provider account, seventy-five percent should come to me in my operating account. If for some reason my twenty-five percent does not add up to enough to handle my in-- my health insurance, my dental insurance, and my un- unemployment, it's up to me to move money out of the operating account, place into that, and then pay that.

50. 0:30:25

    Um, I hope that that makes sense. In other words, that is not a burden at all on the hiring entity, or in this case, the pool company. It's the burden on the independent contractor, just like it is today. But this is creating the Staples Easy Button because now we've created an account for them to control, account for them to own. They can voluntarily opt in with you or opt out, and at the same time, we've given you assurance as a p- as a business owner that by doing that with me, I'm gonna remain as a ten ninety-nine and not move to a W-2.

51. 0:30:52

    Got it. Perfect. Thank you.

52. 0:30:53

    Okay. Thank you.

53. 0:30:55

    All right. I'm gonna ask that you stay there. We've got-

54. 0:30:57

    Oh

55. 0:30:57

    ... three public, unless there's any other questions. No other questions. Uh, we've got three people that are, a, a s- public sign-up sheet and are for, so that's good for you. Nobody against you yet. Um-

56. 0:31:08

    Yet.

57. 0:31:08

    Mark. Yeah. Um, let's see. M- Mark Hyden, you wanna sit next to him and, uh, console him? No, I mean, uh, encourage him, uh, from that standpoint.

58. 0:31:20

    Excuse me.

59. 0:31:21

    I'll do my best to console him. Um, Chairman, members of the committee, my name is, uh, Mark Hyden, uh, and I'm the senior director at, uh, uh, uh, the R Street Institute, which is a free market think tank that supports limited effective government in many areas, including the future of work. And that's why House Bill 987 is of such a special interest to us. I- i- in its simplest form, this legislation defines portable benefits and clarifies that voluntarily contributing, uh, to these accounts, uh, does not constitute evidence of an employer-employee relationship.

60. 0:31:53

    Now, as, as, uh, Chairman Jones has talked about, in large part, uh, this is already the case in Georgia code, but it's not explicitly spelled out. So this bill would clarify rather than transform the code while still delivering far-reaching and much needed benefits. Because with the rise of gig, gig work, like driving for rideshare apps, Georgia's economy has fundamentally evolved in recent years, but our code has not kept pace. So o- right now, over one million Georgians are engaged in some form of self-employment, and a number of people make a living solely through gig work.

61. 0:32:27

    And it's gig work that provides them the flexibility to earn when and however they wish. Uh, but independent contractors often must buy their own costly benefits like health insurance or simply go without them. And we know that there are roughly one point two million uninsured Georgians right now, and twenty-eight percent of gig workers, according to a recent poll, would like health insurance. A voluntary portable benefit system can put these benefits and others within reach. Uh, and a national poll found that eighty percent of self-employed workers would like portable benefits, and we even, uh, saw that there was a portable benefits pilot program conducted here in Georgia in which nearly one quarter of a company's independent cont- contractors opted into the system voluntarily, showing that there is a desire for it here in Georgia.

62. 0:33:12

    But since Georgia's code does not specifically define or explicitly authorize portable benefits by name, some companies may fear that being involved in these contributions and, uh, putting this money aside in these accounts could serve as evidence of an employer-employee arrangement. So in order to clarify the code, uh, make benefits more affordable and more attainable, y- I hope that Georgia will follow the lead of Utah, Tennessee, and Alabama, which have all ratified portable benefits re- legislation. And if they do, it'll be a win for Georgians.

63. 0:33:44

    Uh, so I'll, I'll pause there. Uh, I thank you, Chairman, for your leadership on this. And if there are any questions from the committee, I'd be happy to try to field them.

64. 0:33:52

    No questions. Good job.

65. 0:33:53

    Thank you, Chairman.

66. 0:34:01

    Tony West. We know who you are, so ...

67. 0:34:06

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. My name's Tony West. I'm the state director for Americans For Prosperity here in Georgia, uh, here to support this bill. I, I thank Chairman Jones and, and Mark Pryor, uh, explained the bill pretty well. Uh, we are excited about bills like this that empower people to pursue the type of work that fits their family's needs, and this is what that bill will do. Uh, as Li- as Mark said, our economy's changing, the labor force is evolving, and we wanna make sure our law keeps up with that so that our economy remains strong and dynamic and innovative.

68. 0:34:37

    So I appreciate this committee's favorable consideration.

69. 0:34:40

    Uh, I, I'm, uh, I totally agree when I see the Uber situation. I've had Uber drivers that are college professors. I had one that's did security at the White House. Phenomenal. Always have fun learning what they do, and it's a great way for somebody to take an asset that they have and turn it into dollars for their family. And I mean, we've got lots of businesses like that, so I think that's a g- great, great comment. But appreciate you. And let's see-

70. 0:35:04

    Thank you

71. 0:35:04

    ... we'll next go to Buzz, uh, Brockway. Come on up.

72. 0:35:09

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, there's been a lot of great comments. I won't rehash them. Appreciate Chairman Jones, uh, for bringing this bill. I'm Buzz Brockway with the Georgia Center For Opportunity, and I just wanna add that there was a pilot project actually right here in Atlanta, uh, last year through, through DoorDash that, uh, did exactly this. And it proved to be very popular with the drivers and very popular with DoorDash itself. So I, uh, I hope that you'll all vote in favor of this and bring it to the full Senate for a vote. So thank you, Mr. Chairman.

73. 0:35:41

    Thank you very much. All right, any other questions from the committee? What? Yes. I make a motion to proper time. This is the proper time, sir. Move to do pass. And we got a do pass from, uh, Senator Hodges and a second from, uh, Senator Harbison. No more questions. If you'll raise your right hand in favor of the bill. All right, it is unanimous. Representative Jones, it looks like that you have our approval to move forward.

74. 0:36:11

    Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. I appreciate it.

75. 0:36:14

    All right. Thank- Who's gonna carry? Who's gonna carry? Who, who you want, who, do you have anyone to carry this?

76. 0:36:21

    Yes.

77. 0:36:21

    Yes.

78. 0:36:22

    And this is my sixth bill today.

79. 0:36:24

    Oh.

80. 0:36:25

    Let me, I'll get with your... Uh, w- I gotta go back to my sheet. I'm... Oh.

81. 0:36:30

    That was clear.

82. 0:36:31

    That's great.

83. 0:36:34

    Uh-huh. Ah.

84. 0:36:39

    He is right. It's Shawn.

85. 0:36:41

    I'm part of me senator still.

86. 0:36:42

    I will not clear my throat. Never again.

87. 0:36:46

    I make a motion

88. 0:36:47

    I make a motion. Okay. Motion for... I m- okay. Okay. No regrets. We'll look to that. Okay. Um, for our bills, that is over to, we're finished for today, but I wanna make this announcement, is that, um, uh, Senator Randy Roberts will be heading up a subcommittee for me, uh, dealing with SB 250, S, uh, excuse me, HB 250, HB 1262, HB 1263, HB 1274, and HB 344, and he will be handling that.

89. 0:37:19

    Your meeting, I believe, will be Monday morning, 6:00.

90. 0:37:27

    6:00 AM.

91. 0:37:27

    6:00 AM.

92. 0:37:28

    That's good.

93. 0:37:29

    Okay. So w- we- What's the O stand for in O 600?

94. 0:37:32

    Huh?

95. 0:37:32

    What's the O stand for in O 600?

96. 0:37:35

    Oh my God, sir. The people in my profession are just getting up, just getting ready to get off work at, at 0600 in the morning.

97. 0:37:45

    All right. And with that, we'll have that. Uh, our committee meeting is adjourned.

98. 0:37:52

    There'll be coffee.

99. 0:37:53

    There'll be coffee. Okay.