Debate Heats up on Workers' Compensation Reform

Governor Rauner has spent a good part of the year speaking to business owners across the state about the need for workers' compensation reform. Citing changes enacted in other states, the governor has proposed a series of sweeping changes in the hopes that it will attract investment and business growth within the state.

While the governor touts his proposals, legislators on the House Committee of the Whole are skeptical that the governor's proposals would actually help businesses and workers within the state. This is why on May 5th the committee held a nearly unprecedented 8-hour hearing on the issue. During the course of the hearing, business leaders, private individuals, and insurance companies provided their points of view and their experiences with the workers' compensation system.

One of the most important issues to be brought up centered around the 2011 changes the bipartisan state legislature approved that were intended to reduce the premiums employers paid to insurance companies to cover their employees. The compromise was reached after workers agreed to forfeit many of their rights in exchange for the insurance companies promising to be more transparent with their pricing, and to reduce the premiums they were charging to employers.

Commenting on this issue, Chicago workers' compensation attorney Neal Strom said, "The promised benefits of workers' compensation reform have quite clearly failed to materialize. While benefit payments have been reduced between 15-20%, the premiums insurance companies are charging business owners have not been reduced. Why are the insurers not being held accountable? It's a question that needs answered sooner rather than later."

When first proposed, the National Council on Compensation Insurance called for a 20% rate reduction charged to businesses. This has not happened and over the course of the past four years, insurance companies have pocketed a considerable windfall. During the hearing, the revelation of this information had lawmakers seeing red as they listened to story after story of workers being denied claims by unrepentant representatives of the insurance companies who had lobbied legislators for the changes.

"The actions of the insurance industry are repugnant and reprehensible. Now, Governor Rauner is asking workers in Illinois to surrender more of their rights, and more of their protections, in order to pad the profit margins of the insurance companies. Until insurers are held accountable for this, the prospect of further changes is simply unconscionable," chastised Chicago workers' compensation attorney Neal Strom.

Company :-Strom & Associates - Attorneys at law

User :- Neal Strom

Email :-stromlawyer@gmail.com

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