On Wednesday the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced that the employers could either reduce or eliminate the health insurance for retirees that turn 65 and they qualify for Medicare.

The commission saw that the employers are not required by the law to offer health insurance to their workers, active or retired.

This rule will only authorize what the employers have been doing for a while: to take into account Medicare when they are forming the health packages for their workers, Guardian Unlimited reports.   

It says that they can spend less money on the retirees over 65 years who are taken by Medicare and more on the ones under 65.

The two groups of retirees will have the almost the same benefits, but the company spends less.

Naomi C. Earp, the commission’s chairwoman, said, “This rule will help employers continue to voluntarily provide and maintain these critically important health benefits,” the New York Times states.

According to the surveys by the Kaiser Family Foundation, this year premiums for health insurance sponsored by the employers rose 6.1 percent and since 2001 increased 78 percent.

Earp said in a statement on Wednesday: “By this action, the EEOC seeks to preserve and protect employer-provided retiree health benefits which are increasingly less available and less generous. Millions of retirees rely on their former employer to provide health benefits, and this rule will help employers continue to voluntarily provide and maintain these critically important benefits in accordance with the law.”

James A. Klein, president of the American Benefits Council, said: “The new rule is a victory for common sense and for retirees. Retiree health coverage has been declining for many years. Without this rule, many more retirees, especially early retirees, could find themselves without employer-sponsored coverage.”

The rule had the support of members of Congress, according to EEOC, and also of the employer and labor communities, organizations like Society for Human Resource Management, the AFL-CIO, the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, and the American Benefits Council.

It was observed by the commission that the companies that offer health insurance to retiree can control those benefits along with Medicare by offering retirees an aid benefit in order to cover the health expenses until the retirees can be taken by Medicare.