Greenbeard
Gold Member
For context, almost a quarter of the nation's uninsured work at very small businesses (<25 employees), which are the least likely businesses to offer health benefits. This weekend, the LA Times checks in on how the new tax credit to help those employers cover the costs of health coverage is working out.
Major insurers around the country are reporting that a growing number of small businesses are signing up to give their workers health benefits, a sign of potential progress for the nation's battered healthcare system.
The increase, although not universal, has brought new security to thousands of workers, many of whom did not have insurance or were at risk of losing it.
An important selling point has been a tax credit that the nation's new healthcare law provides to companies with fewer than 25 employees and moderate-to-low pay scales to help offset the cost of providing benefits. The tax credit is one of the first few provisions to kick in; much of the law rolls out over the next few years.
"We certainly did not expect to see this in this economy," said Gary Claxton, who oversees an annual survey of employer health plans for the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation. "It's surprising." [...]
In the six months after the law was signed in March, UnitedHealth Group Inc., the country's largest insurer, added 75,000 new customers who work for companies with fewer than 50 employees. The Minnesota company called the increase notable but declined to reveal further details.
Coventry Health Care Inc., an insurer in Maryland that focuses on small businesses, signed contracts to cover 115,000 new workers in the first nine months of this year, an 8% jump.
In California, Warner Pacific Insurance Services in Westlake Village, a major servicer of insurance brokers, has seen business grow more than 10% this year, a company executive said.
And Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas City, the largest insurer in the Kansas City, Mo., area, is reporting a 58% jump in the number of small businesses buying insurance since April, the first full month after the legislation was signed into law.