Small Businesses and Health Care Reform

With health care bills now moving in both houses of Congress, the GOP is getting desperate. Quite predictably, opponents of reform are pulling out all the stops – spending nearly $10 million each week on lobbyists – in an attempt to stop progress and protect the status quo. Their latest is an all-out assault to scare small business owners. These attacks are outrageous and entirely untrue.

The fact is, our broken health care system is hitting small business harder than anyone else.

- Nearly one third of America’s uninsured – 13 million people – are employees of firms with less than
100 workers.

- Health insurance premiums for single workers rose 74 percent for small businesses from 2001 to 2008.

- More than one third of small businesses have reduced benefits in recent years and since the early 1990s, about a third of small businesses have dropped coverage for their employees altogether.

- Without reform,small businesses will pay nearly $2.4 trillion over the next 10 years in health care costs and lose 178,000 jobs by 2018.

High health care costs are making it impossible for many small businesses to provide insurance to their employees and turn a profit. National Small Business Association President Todd McCracken said, “Health care reform can not wait another year.” And health care reform topped the list of NSBA priorities when the membership recently voted on what issues they wanted Congress and the President to address.

Despite what the opposition would have people believe, President Obama’s plan to reform health care will make health insurance affordable for small businesses and their employees, helping the small business community by:

- Making tax credits available to for small business to provide health insurance. Tax credits will be based on their size, workers’ wages, and how much they contribute toward premiums. According to recent analysis by the Tax Policy Center, about 96% of small business would not be faced with a surcharge.

- Lowering administrative costs. Small businesses pay three times the administrative costs of large businesses for health insurance. Health reform will create a health insurance exchange that will significantly reduce administrative costs by reforming the health insurance market, enabling small businesses to easily and simply compare prices and health plans, and decide which option is right for their workers.

- Freeing up capital to invest in growth. Forty percent of small businesses say that health care costs have had a negative impact on other parts of their business. By lowering health care costs through more efficient care, more of our nation’s dollars can go towards investments in our economy, enabling businesses to thrive.

- Investing in preventative care. Chronic disease costs $1 trillion in lost productivity each year, and small businesses don’t have reserve of workers they can rely on when someone calls in sick. Health reform will require insurance plans to provide free preventive services and create a system that manages illness and disease instead of just treating it after people get sick. Healthy employees are productive employees -- increasing our economy’s output by up to $130 billion according to the Institute of Medicine.

- Sharing responsibility with big businesses. Reform would require larger businesses to provide insurance to their employees, or pay a fee to the government. Small businesses would be exempt from that requirement.

By some estimates, health care reform could save small businesses as much as $855 billion over then next 10 years and prevent the loss of 128,000 jobs.

No business owner wants to choose between cutting benefits, dropping coverage and laying off workers – they shouldn’t have to decide between being profitable or taking care of their employees. Bottom line: health care reform that lowers costs, guarantees choice (including the choice of a public option) and expands access to all Americans is good for small businesses.

UPDATE: This afternoon the DNC hosted a conference call about the importance of health care reform to small businesses with Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky (IL-9), Congressman Frank Pallone (NJ-6), Kristine Reger, the wife of a small business owner in Wisconsin, and Joan Lomask, the owner of a small business in North Carolina. Here’s the audio from the call

Comments (3) «

malpractice insurance cost many doctors $200,000 per year or about $800 per day based on 5 day work week. Lawsuits cause unneeded test to be performed driving up medical cost for everyone. Where is the inclusion of tort reform. We have been sold out time and time again for campaign donations. Washington needs new representation from both parties.

1

leftbehinddemo on July 16, 2009 at 09:29 PM

All the pretty stats would be nice, but the only thing they are trying to do is create a money making scheme to help the insurance industry. Look to Europe on how to set up a medical plan, look at Canada.

You can judge an effective medical plan if it does the following:

-Has a low cost per resident.

-Has a low percentage of the national GDP.

-Keeps the average lifespan of the citizens high.

-Keeps the infant mortality rate low.

Europe and Canada are kicking our asses on these fronts. Their costs are lower, their percentage of the GDP is lower. Plus they have comparable lifespans, if not higher and similar if not lower infant mortality rates. How did they do it? How could we recreate it? Expand Medicare, make health care a part of citizenship. If the government is the game in town which is included with your taxes, health providers will be forced to negotiate fair prices. This will also enable businesses to drop their coverage and force insurance companies to look elsewhere to profit off of the suffering of people. If it is staged in over X number of years, they will recover.

Health care is a RIGHT! Not a for profit industry!

2

A_Real_Leftwing_Liberal on July 17, 2009 at 11:04 AM

LeftBehindDemo makes the point that the President's health care reform plan leaves out any reform of medical malpractice law. Is it a coincidence that the President and many Democrats in Congress have received a huge amount in campaign contributions from the Trial Lawyers? A_Real_LeftWing_Liberal says, "All the pretty stats would be nice, but the only thing they are trying to do is create a money making scheme to help the insurance industry." Lack of malpractice/tort reform in President Obama's health care plan has NOTHING to do with schemes to make the insurance industry make money. It has EVERYTHING to do with pay-back (aka, quid pro quo) to the people who helped him get elected.
Even though medical malpractice/tort reform is one of the MOST IMPORTANT issues affecting the spiraling costs in health care and patient access to services, President Obama will not fix it. He will not even try. He was already paid not to by the Trial Lawyers' contributions--he owes them. How on earth can A_Real_LeftWing_Liberal be so off point? Who does medical malpractice/tort reform most affect financially? Who has the most to lose from caps or other such reform? Who bought President Obama's cooperation with campaign contributions? These are not hard questions, but you first have to shake the thrill off your leg to think clearly.

3

csledbetter on July 21, 2009 at 11:24 PM

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