2008-2009 Legislative Issues Outline for Prosperity The ‘Outline for Prosperity’ provides an overview of the issues American business believes are key to ensuring national prosperity. It represents the consensus of a broad cross section of American businesses and national business associations. As such, the ‘Outline’ becomes the baseline for the hundreds of BIPAC companies, associations and affiliated state programs when evaluating policymaker performance. Click here to view the Outline for Prosperity Education & Workforce Tomorrow’s workforce depends largely on the educational foundation we lay today. Increased education measures promise excellence over mediocrity so those who graduate from high school will either enter institutions of higher learning or enter the workplace prepared to succeed. Education is one of the most important business decisions one could ever make. As technology changes the way employers do business, future workers will need greater skills. In just 10 to 20 years, a high school diploma will be essential for the majority of jobs. Keeping students in school is a critical component for the workforce in Texas. According to the non-profit, Washington D.C.-based Editorial Projects in Education, only 66.8 percent of Texas students graduate from high school. Texas economist Ray Perryman says that keeping kids in school isn’t just good for them, but good for the economy. He estimates that a 10 percent reduction in dropouts would produce 175,000 new Texas jobs and $200 billion in economic output. Environmental Quality Balancing continued economic and job growth with clean air and water is important to the future of Texas. We can have both. With the annual rate of economic growth projected to be 3.7 percent between 2007 and 2010, Texas depends on clean water to manufacture products and electric power to fuel that growth. Texas businesses are committed to reducing air emissions and waste water discharges. In the two largest cities in Texas between 1991 and 2005, business and industry reduced air emissions significantly. In Houston, the reduction was over 22 percent even though the population grew 28 percent. In Dallas, the amount of reduction was nine percent in the face of a 29 percent increase in population. In addition, from 1988 to 2004, toxic releases fell over 57.4 percent in Texas. The cost of these emission reductions for industry, however, has been high. And, the challenge of reaching compliance with federal Clean Air Act standards in the future continues to grow. The path is uncertain, but one thing is clear—the responsibility for future emission reductions must be shared equitably among all emission sources. Health Care As health care spending continues to grow at unsustainable rates, employers must stand united in asking the Texas Legislature to bring sanity and stability to private- and government-sponsored health insurance. The Texas Legislature has an opportunity to solve what has grown from a nagging problem into a statewide crisis: the affordability and availability of private and government health insurance resulting in affordable, quality health care for all Texans. Although employers recently received good news, average health insurance premium increases are the lowest since 2000, no one is celebrating. Health care costs and premium increases have outpaced GDP growth, wages and inflation causing employers and employees to dig deeper into their pockets to pay for coverage. Health insurance premiums average $11,000 per family. Even when an employer offers coverage, an increasing number of employees are declining employer-sponsored coverage due to the rising cost of enrollment. As a result, only 60 percent of employers offer health insurance to their employees, down from 69 percent in 2000. Government-sponsored programs are equally troubled, consuming more tax dollars than ever before. The cost of Medicaid has risen at an average of 8.2 percent each year since 1995, far outpacing states’ revenue growth. According to the November 2006 Employers & Health Care: Crisis & Solutions 2006 Report. The report found:
Taxes & Spending Lowering taxes for business would create more good-paying jobs and make Texas the best state to in which to live, educate your children and do business. According to the Texas Public Policy Foundation, although Texas is considered a low-tax state, it is one of the highest direct business-taxing states in the nation. In 2003 Texas faced a $10 billion shortfall in which advocates for the business community successfully fought to reduce spending instead of raising taxes. In 2007, Texas achieved one of the largest surpluses in the history of the state—$8 to $15 billion. Already there are some legislators ready to spend taxpayers hard-earned money. Many groups across the state advocate that the surplus should not be used to create new obligations, but should be saved or used to provide businesses tax cuts to stimulate further economic growth. Tort Reform Frivolous litigation needlessly drives up the cost of doing business in Texas, thus it is critical that our hard-fought reforms are preserved. In the 2003 legislative session, balance to the civil justice court system was achieved with the passage of HB 4, a comprehensive tort reform bill that has reduced litigation costs, curbed class action lawsuits, established caps on non-economic damages in medical malpractice lawsuits in addition to many other long overdue initiatives. The legislation brought Texas into the national limelight as a shining example of what other states can do to prevent plaintiff attorneys from picking and choosing their targets by the size of a business’ bank account. In 2005, SB 15 marked the beginning of the end of asbestos lawsuit abuse and of a system that allows profits to come before the welfare of seriously ill victims. Before the passage of SB 15, an estimated 90 percent of asbestos claims were filed by people with no current diagnosis of an asbestos-related illness, yet these cases received the vast majority of the payouts. Pro-prosperity groups will continue to push the Texas Legislature to adopt additional reforms that will strengthen our economy and attract new business to the Lone Star State. Transportation An efficient transportation system is essential to continued economic success of our state. Texas must not only be aggressive in funding and constructing new roads, it must advance other transportation options to be vital components of an overall solution. The U.S. Census Bureau predicts that by the year 2015, Texas will be home to an additional six million citizens. While this is good news for the economy, it is not good news for Texas roads. Congestion has grown across the state causing travel time to double or even triple in some areas. According to the Texas Transportation Institute, Texas’ Metropolitan areas (Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, Austin, El Paso, Laredo, Corpus Christi, Beaumont and Brownsville) are within the top 85 congested areas in the nation. Houston ranked fifth for traveler delay. The Dallas/Fort Worth area ranked sixth. Workers’ Compensation The Texas business community must stay vigilant and work together to bring improved care to injured workers and lower premiums to employers. During the 79th Legislative Session, the Texas Legislature took massive steps towards reforming the antiquated and dysfunctional workers’ compensation by enacting House Bill 7. Prior to the passage of HB 7, employers witnessed 45 percent premium increases from the year 2000 to 2004. A report by the Research and Oversight Council (ROC) on Workers’ Compensation also revealed significant cost discrepancies for the similar care under different health care models. Costs under the workers’ compensation system were six times higher than the costs under group health networks. Texas is the only state in the nation that allows employers to opt out of providing workers' compensation benefits and allow them to create their own insurance plan to control costs and make injured workers whole. Over 40 percent of Texas businesses are nonsubscribers, and historically have had significantly greater satisfaction ratings and reduced expenses when compared to the workers’ compensation system Prior to 2005, the situation was grim. Employers were faced with eye popping premiums, providers were fleeing and employees were caught in a failing system. In 2004, only 23 percent of doctors were willing to accept new workers' compensation patients. According to the Texas Department of Insurance rate fillings as on November 2006, employers could see a 20 percent premium reduction on their comp coverage because of the 2005 reforms. The numbers tell us that the system is improving. 
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