Families USA Applauds Bipartisan Talks to Advance Commonsense Health Care Solutions, Leads Call Urging Lawmakers to Focus on Improving Affordability and Lowering Health Care Costs - Families USA Skip to Main Content
03.13.2025 / Press Release

Families USA Applauds Bipartisan Talks to Advance Commonsense Health Care Solutions, Leads Call Urging Lawmakers to Focus on Improving Affordability and Lowering Health Care Costs

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Amid recent reports of revived bipartisan talks to advance a health care package that was abandoned last Congress, Families USA and nearly 70 organizations are today urging Congress to act without delay to take key steps to address America’s health care affordability crisis through commonsense reforms. Last Congress, policymakers in the House and Senate worked in a bipartisan way to craft important health care legislation that would provide critical relief for families struggling with rising health care costs. Today’s letter brings together a broad coalition of organizations representing consumers and communities, small and large businesses, health care clinicians, providers and patients, and working families, spotlighting a strong constituency to support and advance these pro-consumer policies that Americans want and need.

“Congress has an opportunity to turn the tide on this [health care affordability] crisis by advancing bipartisan, commonsense legislation that could address some of our health care system’s most obvious failings and take critical steps to ensure everyone in America has access to the high quality and affordable health care they deserve” wrote the organizations in the letter. “While some proposals currently in Congress to cut or cap coverage would strip away access to public and private health insurance from our nation’s families, and would only serve to further threaten their financial stability, we urge you to consider an agenda to actually address affordability for both taxpayers and consumers.”

In 2023, the House of Representatives advanced the Lower Costs, More Transparency Act in late 2023, which included steps forward on critical pro-consumer health care reforms such as improving health care price transparency; requiring hospitals to charge the same price for the same service, regardless of where patients receive care; improving oversight of pharmacy benefit managers; and providing long-term funding extensions for community health centers and teaching health centers. And this past December, the House and Senate came to a bipartisan agreement to finally get some of these priorities across the finish line. Congress had all of the pieces in place to pass a bipartisan package that would begin to lower health care costs and provide more financial stability for families. Instead, at the last minute, House Republican leadership caved to billionaires and special interests, disregarding their constituents’ health and economic security and walking away from vetted, commonsense solutions.

Earlier this year, Families USA released a concrete and actionable agenda of policy recommendations that would result in lower health care costs and generate hundreds of billions of dollars in savings. The letter calls for advancing some of these proven solutions that would save people and taxpayers money rather than moving forward with devastating cuts to health care coverage. Such as:

Promote meaningful transparency and accountability:

  • Strengthening hospital and health plan price transparency by requiring all hospitals and health plans to disclose their negotiated rates in dollars and cents.
  • Ending dishonest hospital billing to ensure that big hospital corporations are not overcharging in outpatient settings, saving an estimated $403 million over ten years.

Reduce waste and inefficiencies driven by corporate health systems:

  •  Enacting a comprehensive same service, same price policy to stop big hospital corporations from charging more for the same care, and shifting patients to higher-cost care settings, saving an estimated $157 billion over ten years.

Root out conflicts of interest that increase health care costs:

  •  Prohibiting anti-competitive contracting including between providers and insurers that limits patients’ access to alternative sources of health care, which is estimated to save $3.2 billion over ten years.
  • Requiring greater transparency around the role of private equity and corporate ownership in health care to ensure all Americans, including those in rural communities, have access to the health care they need at a price they can afford.