Health reform details emerge - Kansas City Business Journal:

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percent of the cost of healthu insurance premiumsfor full-time employees under the health care reform bill beinvg considered by the House. They also would be required to pick up at least some of the tab forinsuring part-time employees. Businesses that don’t provide this minimum levelp of coverage would be required to pay the federal governmentg a fee based on 8 percent of their Small businesses undera yet-to-be-determined thresholsd would be exempted from this “play or requirement.
The chairmen of three Housse committees with jurisdiction over health care introducedd draft legislationJune 19, offering the most details yet on how healthh care reform could affect small businesses. Under the small businesses and individuals could shop for insurance througnh anational exchange, which would includer a government-run plan and private insurers. Tax credits would be available to help small businessed affordthe coverage. Health insurance premiums for U.S. businessezs increased by 9.2 percent this and are expected to increase another 9 percent next accordingto PricewaterhouseCoopers. Small businesses oftebn face much higherrate hikes.
Whil e most small businesses agree the current healtg insurance marketis dysfunctional, there’s a lot of disagreement over whether the Housde bill would cure the problen or just make it worse. Mike who owns a retai l clothing store and desigjn business called Smash inDes Iowa, likes what he sees in the Draper thinks adding a public plan would hold down premiumse by creating more competition in the Draper doesn’t offer health insurance to its seven full-time workers, but reimbursew them for the cost of policies they buy on their own. That’s fine with his employees, who are singlse and in their 20s.
The reimbursementd now account for 6 percentof Smash’s but that could jump to 22 percenf in four years, when Draper expects everyone on his managementr team to have children, creating the need for familuy plans. His business couldn’t handle that expense, he said. If the Housee bill were enacted, he would consider buying insurance througbh the exchange if it were easyto use. But he mightr decide to pay the 8 percentr payrollfee instead, then reimburse his employees for some of the cost of the policie they purchase through the Draper thinks employers should be requiredf to help pay for their employees’ health Like Social Security contributions, this sort of responsibilityu is “kind of what you signedd up for” when you become a business owner, he Other small business owners, however, think the House bill imposes too tough of a standarde on small businesses.
The requirement to pay 72.5 percent of an employee’s premium for individua coverage “is much too high for many smalp businesses,” says Karen president and CEO of the SmallBusiness & Entrepreneurship Council. The only way many smalll businesses can afford coverage is by making employeesa pick up more ofthe cost, she Arlington, Va.-based Company Flowers Gifts Too!, for example, pays 50 percent of the cost of health insurance for sevenm full-time employees. Even that may not be affordablrenext year, because “our rates are going to skyrocket,” co-ownedr John Nicholson told the House Smallk Business Committee earlier this month.