Opinion ID: 6984727
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Did Fox violate Titles I or III?

Text: The crux of Weyer’s complaint against Fox is that Titles I and III of the Act prohibit Fox from offering as a fringe benefit an insurance policy that gives different levels of benefits to those with different types of disabilities. Seven Circuits have specifically rejected this argument 68 and, in the process, offered a plethora of good reasons for doing so. We find their reasoning persuasive. First, there is no discrimination under the Act where disabled individuals are given the same opportunity as everyone else, so insurance distinctions that apply equally to all employees cannot be discriminatory. 69 Fox did not treat Weyer any differently because of her disability. It simply gave her the same opportunity that it gave all the rest of its employees— buy into the group policy with the limitation at the cheaper, group price or buy her own individual insurance coverage without the limitation at whatever the market price may be. Like the Seventh Circuit, we note that there is no claim here that [the Defendant] discriminated on the basis of disability in offering its pension plan to anyone. It did not charge higher prices to disabled people, on the theory that they might require more in benefits. Nor did it vary the terms of its plan depending on whether or not the employee was disabled. All employees-the perfectly healthy, the physically disabled, and the mentally disabled-had a plan that promised them long-term benefits from the onset of disability until age 65 if their problem was physical, and long-term benefits for two years if the problem was mental or nervous. 70 Second, had Congress intended to control which coverages had to be offered by employers, it would have spoken more plainly because of the well-established marketing process to the contrary. “Insurers have historically and consistently made distinctions between mental and physical illness in offering health and disability coverage.” 71 As the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s [“EEOC”] guidance on health insurance explains, “[t]ypically, a lower level of benefits is provided for the treatment of mental/nervous conditions than is provided for the treatment of physical conditions.” 72 Even the EEOC concluded in their guidance on health insurance, contrary to their litigation position in this case, that distinctions between types of disability do not violate the Act. Like the D.C. and Third Circuits, we decline the invitation to be a “super-actuary ... by requiring insurers to justify their coverage plans.” 73 Since the passage of the Act, Congress passed the Mental Health Parity Act, which requires that health plans with no limit for medical benefits must also have no limit on mental health benefits. Congress rejected an amendment to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 that would have required parity in insurance coverage for mental and physical illnesses. Had Congress provided that the Act means what Weyer and amici urge, then this subsequent legislation would have been superfluous. As the Seventh Circuit explained, we are loath to read into [the Act] a rule that has been the subject of vigorous, sometimes contentious, national debate for the last several years. Few, if any, mental health advocates have thought that the result they would like to see has been there all along in the ADA. 74 Weyer and amici offer little to refute this overwhelming weight of authority. Instead, they argue that the rest of the Circuits have just gotten it wrong, and look to the EEOC’s new position and the recent Supreme Court decision in Olmstead v. L.C. 75 to carry the day. Neither can. The EEOC’s current interpretation of the Act is that it forbids differential insurance coverage in disability policies. That interpretation, however, is entitled to no deference. Rather than resolving an ambiguity or exercising delegated authority, it conflicts with the plain language of the statute, as interpreted by seven Circuits and the Supreme Court. 76 It conflicts with binding Title III regulations. 77 It conflicts with other EEOC guidance on a virtually identical issue. 78 And the EEOC does not even have “administrative authority” over Title III. 79 Nor does Olmstead support Weyer’s construction. In Olmstead, the State refused to transfer several institutionalized mentally ill patients from their institutions to community-care programs despite their treating physicians’ recommendations. The patients challenged the State’s actions under Title II of the Act. The Court held that the patients had stated a cause of action because unjustified institutional isolation of mentally ill patients was discrimination because of disability. Olm-stead does not speak to insurance classifications such as the one at issue. Olm-stead spoke to segregation of the disabled through unwarranted institutional confinement. Applying Olmstead to insurance classifications would conflict with the Court’s decisions in Alexander v. Choate 80 and Traynor v. Turnage, 81 which both endorse distinctions between types of disabilities, and Congress’s clear instruction in the insurance safe harbor that the Act was not intended to reach common insurance practices such as underwriting of risks.