mr. speaker , i think the rules committee has made a terrible mistake here , and not the usual rules committee sort of mistake , because they have actually allowed to come to the floor a substitute that is so clearly superior to the ahp bill it is amazing . 
now , let my friends on the other side understand , i am not against ahps . 
i am an original cosponsor of the gentleman from texas ( mr. johnson 's ) legislation . 
ahps would be an improvement over current market conditions , which are appalling . 
but this plan put forward by the gentleman from wisconsin ( mr. kind ) xz4002180 and the gentleman from new jersey ( mr. andrews ) xz4000080 is better than ahps , and let me describe some of the ways . 
first , the gentleman from louisiana ( mr. boustany ) xz4006360 mentioned choice earlier . 
under the ahp approach , the average small business might be able to offer their employees one or two insurance plans , and that employee of the small business would have no idea whether their doctor was going to be a apart of one of those plans . 
but under the federal employee approach , such as the one that we enjoy in this house of representatives , they could have 10 or 20 or more plans to choose from , and the likelihood that their physician , their caregiver , would be part of one or more of those plans increases substantially . 
so when you are talking about unleashing the free market to work for the individual , the federal employee health benefits-type plan , and this would not infringe on federal employees ' benefits , but it would set up a parallel organization that small businesses could benefit from , the opportunities for the small businesses of america are magnificent under this approach . 
another key aspect of this is the substitute approach is more likely to work . 
ahps are largely a thought experiment . 
they have never really worked anywhere . 
but the federal employee health benefit system has worked well for decades , 30 or 40 years of a magnificent track record of experience . 
it has got bipartisan support . 
men and women of goodwill on both sides of the aisle know that this sort of approach works ; it lowers the sales load , it increases the risk pool to the maximum size which you need for lower group rates . 
it really is the fairest and best way to approach this nagging small business problem that we have had . 
it is also going to be more affordable , because while it lowers the sales load and increases the size of the risk pool , it is fairer to all industries . 
there are probably going to be a lot of insurance companies that want to offer insurance to software companies , because those employees tend to be young and healthy . 
how many are going to be eager to insure older rust belt industries ? 
the tax credit approach that my friend has mentioned has had to be adjusted for purposes of this substitute , but we need to acknowledge , as my friend from new jersey ( mr. andrews ) xz4000080 mentioned , health care is already seriously subsidized in this country . 
all we are trying to do is make that subsidy fairer . 
i think also the substitute approach would make the system higher quality . 
first of all , under ahps , there would be minimal solvency requirements . 
by completely overturning all state regulation , as ahps would do , that is a truly radical approach , and while my friends on the other side may be radicals in this regard , i think they are going further than they realize . 
these insurance plans need to be thoroughly solvent . 
you need to have adequate capital requirements so that you know the insurance is going to be there when you need it . 
i think you would have better benefits under this plan , too , because you would have more proven traditional insurance policies that i think more folks who work for small businesses are accustomed to . 
let me admit , mr. speaker , in closing , our approach is less famous . 
why ? 
because we do not have every pac and trade association in washington , d.c . 
favoring this because they stand to personally benefit from promoting ahps to their members . 
they are desperate for non-dues revenue for those associations . 
for any tourist who comes to washington , if you do not think these pacs and trade associations are rich enough , come visit again . 
you will see skyscrapers full of these folks all over town , and they would love to make money as insurance salesmen to all the small businesses in america . 
that is not doing justice for our folks back home . 
as i say , ahps are an improvement , but they are not as good as the kind-andrews approach . 
please vote for kind-andrews . 
