IHRSA - Workforce Health Improvement

Workforce Health Improvement Program (WHIP) Act (S.913/H.R. 2106)

Join the Campaign for a Healthier America as we work to pass this WHIP Act as part of health care reform legislation. Join the virtual march on Washington as we ask Congress and President Obama for their support of healthier lifestyles for all Americans. Visit the Campaign for a Healthier America and speak out today!

The WHIP Act would ensure that the wellness benefit from off-site fitness facilities is not taxed as additional income for employees. We believe the benefits of this legislation would include: encouraging employers to offer more wellness programs that include fitness services to their employees; improving the health of the American workforce; and decreasing the cost of employee health care for employers.

Lead sponsors Representative Ron Kind (D-Wis) and Senator John Cornyn (R-Tex) reintroduced the Workforce Health Improvement Program (WHIP) Act (H.R.2106/S.913) into the US House and US Senate on April 27^th, 2009. The WHIP Act has been referred to the House Committee on Ways & Means and the Senate Committee on Finance.

During the 109^th session of Congress the WHIP Act garnered impressive support from both sides of the aisle with 44 democrats and 66 republicans signing on as co-sponsors. One hundred and ten co-sponsors is far beyond any other health promotion bill during that session. Similarly, in the 110^th the bills enjoyed broad bi-partisan support.

Working Together to Pass the WHIP Act

The broad, bi-partisan support of the bill is thanks to the dedicated IHRSA members who lobbied via emails, letters, faxes, phone calls, and visits to Capitol Hill during the annual Legislative Summit in support of the WHIP Act.

While Members of Congress always want to hear directly from their constituents, IHRSA has been working for several years in conjunction with the National Coalition to Promote Physical Activity (NCPPA), the Americans for Tax Reform, Citizens Against Government Waste and other organizations, including the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association (SGMA) and the Society for Human Resource Management to support this legislation in Washington, DC.

While the coalition is busy lobbying, the fitness industry and fitness consumers must continue to speak with a unified voice on behalf of healthy lifestyles. To facilitate your efforts IHRSA has developed the Campaign for a Healthier America.

Join the Campaign

Become part of a nation-wide effort of fitness professionals to support positive health policy, such as the WHIP Act. The Campaign for a Healthier America has compiled a series a quick and easy steps you can take to encourage your US Representative, US Senators and President Obama to support the bill.

Write an email or a fax using the Exercise Your Rights online advocacy system. Simply enter your home and business address and the system determines your legislators. Then use the talking points provided to write your own personalized message. For tips on how to write an effective advocacy message, visit Grassroots Advocacy 101. It takes about ten minutes to write a powerful advocacy message

Call your legislators' offices. Follow-up a few days after sending your email or fax. Talking points for your call are available and you can use the Elected Official Directory to look up their office phone numbers. Before you call, review our tips for calling legislators. Since legislative offices are very busy, calls generally take about 15 minutes

Involve your staff. Encourage your club staff to take part in the advocacy effort. It's a great way to motivate them and let them speak out on something they are passionate about- sharing the joys of a healthy lifestyle

Visit their district offices. All members of Congress have offices located in their home district. While visiting a staff member at this office is a great option, you can try to arrange a meeting with your lawmakers themselves when they are working there during designated district work periods. Since there are no committee hearings or floor votes as they do in DC, they have more time available to meet with constituents. Learn more about office visits

Key Information about the WHIP Act

Summary

Under current tax law, businesses are permitted to deduct the cost of onsite exercise facilities and the benefit is not taxed as additional income to the employee. However, if an employer provides this same benefit at an offsite facility, it cannot take advantage of the tax deduction and must bear the administrative costs for complying with IRS rules while employees who take advantage of the benefit must pay income tax on the value of the subsidy.

The WHIP Act would eliminate this inequity, allowing for the balanced tax treatment of health club memberships as an employee benefit ' re-affirming employers' right to deduct the cost of providing health club benefits to their workers and exclude the wellness benefit from being considered additional income for employees.

Background

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that healthcare costs directly associated with inactivity exceeded $76 billion in 2000; roughly one-third of those costs ($25 billion) fall directly on the U.S. taxpayer since approximately one in three Americans is covered by a taxpayer-funded health plan.
Public health experts agree that people who maintain active healthy lifestyles dramatically reduce their risk of contracting chronic diseases, and a physically fit population results in a decrease in healthcare costs and improved worker productivity.
Current tax law excludes from employee income the value of 'on-premises' athletic facilities provided by employers. However, if health club services to employees are provided in off-site facilities, the value of the benefit to the employee is taxable income.
WHIP eliminates this inequity, allowing employers to deduct the cost of health club memberships for their employees and ensure that this benefit would not be classified as additional income to employees.
In 2005, the Joint Committee on Taxation determined that the provisions of the WHIP Act would cost $526 million over a ten year period. This moderate budget estimate stands in stark contrast to the $25 billion in annual healthcare savings the CDC estimates the federal government could achieve if every American adult engaged in regular exercise.
The WHIP Act alone will not get every American off the couch and moving, but recent polling reveals that 78% of Americans claim that they would exercise more regularly if their employer subsidized a fitness center membership.
By enacting the WHIP Act, Congress has the opportunity to create the most conducive environment possible for promoting additional workplace fitness programs at companies, both large and small. Given its relatively low cost to high return on investment, the WHIP Act represents a win-win wellness benefit that will put more money back into Americans' pockets while at the same time promoting healthier lifestyles and reducing the national healthcare expenditure.