Corporate employers and their assertions that the newly signed healthcare reform law will force liabilities on their books for coverage will have to prove them, before the chair of the House & Energy Commerce Cmte. — Congressman Henry Waxman. A handful of the nation’s largest employers went public with the news that reform legislation would cause costs to be incurred, of which AT&T’s were the largest — somewhere in the neighborhood of $1B.

“The new law is designed to expand coverage and bring down costs, so your assertions are a matter of concern,” Waxman and Stupak, both Democrats, wrote in the letters yesterday. “They also appear to conflict with independent analyses.”

If anything, the push is on for major employers to rethink healthcare plans and benefits for their employees, as many of the provisions inherent in Obama’s new reform law are designed to benefit small business. Could Big Corporate’s initial problems with this legislation provide another siphon of longstanding criticisms from the GOP for the next six months, or will the transparency that Waxman seeks create a backlash in those arguments — that Obama’s and the Democrats’ mechanisms for reform actually will benefit the healthcare consumer and not huge potential corporate donors? | LINK

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