Federal Judge tosses Maryland Wal*Mart health ins. law

Maryland law was already pre-empted by fed law

The "first of its kind" so-called Wal*Mart health insurance minimum spending requirement law passed in Maryland, by the Democrat controlled Maryland Legislature, over objection (and I believe over a veto) of Maryland's Republican Governor Robert Ehrlich and others in the GOP was invalidated by a Judge today.

U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz decided that the Maryland Fair Share Health Care Fund Act would have hurt Wal-Mart by requiring it to track and allocate benefits for its Maryland employees in a different way from how it keeps track of employee benefits in other states. Motz wrote that the law "imposes legally cognizable injury upon Wal-Mart."
Motz cited the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act, which he said pre-empts "any and all state laws insofar as they may now or hereafter relate to any employee benefit plan."
"My finding that the act is pre-empted is in accordance with long established Supreme Court law that state laws which impose health or welfare mandates on employers are invalid under ERISA," Motz wrote in his 32-page opinion.

news source cited at end of this article

Maryland Democrats had passed this law, partly at the behest of Union labor and lobbyists (who still wield great power in Maryland, thanks to their partnership with the Democrats that overwhelmingly control the legislature), to require Wal*Mart -- and any other similarly large company that employed the requisite number of employees in the state (which, magically enough was NO OTHER company since the law was fairly narrowly written to really only apply to Wal*Mart) -- to spend a certain percentage of it's revenues on health care benefits for their workers.

While the idea sounds good and has lofty goals, the law was highly discriminatory and hostile to Wal*Mart and the chances of the law withstanding a legal challenge was pretty easy to anticipate as NONE.

As usual it seems that the Democrat controlled legislature, even when faced with the obvious -- the knowledge that the law wouldn't pass muster -- didn't care that they were wasting the money of the citizens of the state to pass a useless law and then wasting more money trying to defend it never really cared about such waste. They cared about having potential sound bites to use in campaigns where they could trumpet their action against the big evil corporation. They cared about being able to tell poor workers (or at least the poor workers that are employed by Wal*Mart) that they were looking out for them. What they didn't care about was knowing that they were passing a law that wouldn't last even a few months once it hit the court system.

It still sickens me to see Maryland being made a joke of in legal circles, and being seen as unfriendly to businesses. It is what it is though, and until Maryland voters wake up and start tossing the worthless pol's out on their butts, those pol's will keep screwing them over and keep delivering empty promises on issues that never really mattered at all.

Perhaps the pol's should invest their time into helping to cut taxes and make Maryland a more pro-business and pro-growth state where residents could get better jobs with better benefits, rather than having to cut every corner in their own spending so they can afford the onerous taxation and still be able to feed and cloth themselves. If they did, then Wal*Mart and other employers that tend to pay lower wages would be *naturally* forced to pay more money and offer more benefits to their employees thanks to marketplace competition.

Imagine that concept -- if you do, you're well ahead of the state Democrats

Original source for news discussed here: Judge Overturns Wal-Mart Health Care Law

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Oh, let me add here that chances of the Democrats in the state (of Maryland) ever "fixing" this law and getting something passed that accomplishes their original goals here remains nil. They may try, they may blow some wind over it and trumpet their cause in front of the voters, but they have -- as the original judge here noted -- already been pre-empted by federal law.

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It is a shame that the judge did not strike it down for the most obvious reason - that it was patently unfair. But I am not as optimistic as you that they will not try another end run.

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