Solutions Start Here Independent Group
Urges Health Overhaul
to Relieve Small Business
SMALL BUSINESSES generate half of America’s Gross Domes-tic Product (GDP) and create two-thirds of net new jobs annually, yet the lack of quality, afford-able health care is crippling their suc-cess, according to the National Federa-tion of Independent Business (NFIB).
The NFIB’s grass-roots politics, which included a massive direct mail and telephone cam-paign, along with a blitz of lawmaker lobbying, helped derail President Bill Clinton’s effort to overhaul the health insurance system during the 1990s. “The situation for small business is much worse than it was in 1994 in terms of cost,” says Todd Stottlemyer, NFIB president. “We can’t just say ‘no’ today.”
According to a study by the Common-wealth Fund, a nonprofit research group, small business workers pay 18 percent more for insurance premiums than their counterparts at larger firms. Similar research from the RAND Corpor-ation found that the economic burden of providing health insurance for workers increased more for small businesses than for large ones from 2000 to 2005, but the spike did not cause a significant number of small employers to abandon the benefit.
However, new data from the NFIB show that nationally, 51 percent of small-business owners and 47 percent of their employees say they have had difficulty keeping up with the cost of health care.
Polls among NFIB members have found that one in three small business owners say their No. 1 voting issue in the 2008 presidential election will be fixing health care.
The group recently released its grass roots, multi-million dollar campaign, Solutions Start Here — a set of 10 principles for small business health care reform — to give the small business community a voice in the national debate on health care reform. The following is a summary of its principles:
1. Universal—Everyone should have access to quality healthcare.
2. Private—Private business, not govern-ment, should provide most health care and health insurance.
3. Affordable—Health care costs should be reasonable, predictable, and controllable.
4. Unbiased—Big companies, small companies, and individuals should all buy health insurance on the same level playing field.
5. Competitive—Consumers shopping for health insurance should have many choices among insurers, doctors, and hospitals.
6. Portable—You should be able to move or change jobs without worrying about losing your health insurance.
7. Transparent—Information on costs and quality of care should be easily avail-able. Also, patients’ privacy must be protected.
8. Efficient—You should get the highest quality and most value out of the dollars you spend on health care.
9. Evidence-Based—The best treatment choices require good information on the available options.
10. Realistic—Health care reform must proceed quickly, but not recklessly.
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