Smallest businesses, self-employed find workarounds to avoid pain of health ... Crain's Chicago Business
The smallest businesses have always been the least likely to pay for employee health insurance, and ever-increasing premium rates and the recession are prompting even more of them to drop out of the system.
In 2001, 58% of firms with three to nine employees provided health coverage, according to the Menlo Park, Calif.-based Kaiser Family Foundation; in 2009, only 46% of the smallest firms did, compared with 72% of companies with 10 to 24 workers, 87% of companies with 25 to 49 workers and more than 95% of firms with 50 or more workers.
Kerry Finnegan, a senior partner at consulting firm Mercer LLC in Chicago, estimates that between 5% and 10% of Mercer clients with fewer than 50 employees dropped coverage in the past year.
For many, costs have become unsustainable. Health premiums have risen almost five times as much as the overall rate of inflation for small employers since 2000, the Washington, D.C.-based Employee Benefit Research Institute reports. The cost for a small business