Volunteer Firefighters Fight Obamacare Regs
IRS rules and mandates a threat to operations
Volunteer firefighters are counting on Congress to throw cold water on IRS rules placing them under Obamacare mandates that could bankrupt their operations.
Bipartisan legislation would waive the requirement that volunteer departments provide the kind of comprehensive health coverage that full-time paid firefighters receive.
Though the U.S. Department of Labor has long held that volunteer fire crews are, in fact, volunteers, the IRS puts them under the Obamacare umbrella as employees.
Except for larger urban areas, most U.S. communities are served by fire and rescue squads staffed by part-time volunteers. Of the country's 1.1 million professional firefighters, 753,000 are volunteers, according to the National Fire Protection Association.
Hide Comments (0)
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post commentsMute this user?
Ban this user?
Un-ban this user?
Nuke this user?
Un-nuke this user?
Flag this comment?
Un-flag this comment?