Health insurance choices for small business

When Zimmerman Industries’ health insurance came up for renewal this year, its carrier was more than willing to continue its existing coverage.

Provided, that is, Zimmerman paid double the previous premium: 100.4 percent more, to be exact.

What I am doing in my 100 employee operation is telling them to go get insurance on obamacare. I give them the amount I gave before minus the penalty and that’s it. I pay not 1 cent more. And their reimbursement goes down as the penalty goes up. And if they don’t like it, I tell them to vote republican.

I truly hope that strategy works for you. I just read an article that has me a little concerned, though. It basically states that in addition to the fine, there is an excise tax of $36,500 per employee. It doesn’t say how many employees a company must have to meet that requirement. http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Obamacare-employers-IRS-taxes/2014/05/26/id/573326/

It’s not part of the exchange. It is insurance that the company underwrites directly for it’s employees. Insurance companies can process the claims for a fee. the stop loss provisions are what insurance companies have reserves for. The reserves would not be practical for a regular business. thus the stop loss policy.

Due to the fact that my employer offered a "gold plated Cadillac" plan, they had to drop it due to the 40% tax that Obamacare would force on them. My company managed to keep the rates low, however my deductible quadrupled, from $500 to $2000, and my maximum out of pocket more than tripled, from $1500 to $4600.

Oh, and did anyone else notice that a part of Obamacare was a tinkering with the tax code, that jacked up the minimum medical expenses to 10% before you can begin deducting the expenses?

Mark

After five years of the federal government telling the public that despite a $3.5 trillion increase in monetary expansion, the inflation rate is below +2%

You might be headed for trouble. Obama just rewrote the law again:

I.R.S. Bars Employers From Dumping Workers Into Health Exchanges

* Alaska: Begich (D-AK), Yea
* Arkansas: Lincoln (D-AR), Yea Pryor (D-AR), Yea
* California: Boxer (D-CA), Yea Feinstein (D-CA), Yea
* Colorado: Bennet (D-CO), Yea Udall (D-CO), Yea
* Connecticut: Dodd (D-CT), Yea Lieberman (ID-CT), Yea
* Delaware: Carper (D-DE), Yea Kaufman (D-DE), Yea
* Florida: Nelson (D-FL), Yea
* Hawaii: Akaka (D-HI), Yea Inouye (D-HI), Yea
* Illinois: Burris (D-IL), Yea Durbin (D-IL), Yea
* Indiana: Bayh (D-IN), Yea
* Iowa: Harkin (D-IA), Yea
* Kentucky: Bunning (R-KY), Not Voting
* Louisiana: Landrieu (D-LA), Yea
* Maryland: Cardin (D-MD), Yea Mikulski (D-MD), Yea
* Massachusetts: Kerry (D-MA), Yea Kirk (D-MA), Yea
* Michigan: Levin (D-MI), Yea Stabenow (D-MI), Yea
* Minnesota: Franken (D-MN), Yea Klobuchar (D-MN), Yea
* Missouri: McCaskill (D-MO), Yea
* Montana: Baucus (D-MT), Yea Tester (D-MT), Yea
* Nebraska: Nelson (D-NE), Yea
* Nevada: Reid (D-NV), Yea
* New Hampshire: Shaheen (D-NH), Yea
* New Jersey: Lautenberg (D-NJ), Yea Menendez (D-NJ), Yea
* New Mexico: Bingaman (D-NM), Yea Udall (D-NM), Yea
* New York: Gillibrand (D-NY), Yea Schumer (D-NY), Yea
* North Carolina: Hagan (D-NC), Yea
* North Dakota: Conrad (D-ND), Yea Dorgan (D-ND), Yea
* Ohio: Brown (D-OH), Yea
* Oregon: Merkley (D-OR), Yea Wyden (D-OR), Yea
* Pennsylvania: Casey (D-PA), Yea Specter (D-PA), Yea
* Rhode Island: Reed (D-RI), Yea Whitehouse (D-RI), Yea
* South Dakota: Johnson (D-SD), Yea
* Vermont: Leahy (D-VT), Yea Sanders (I-VT), Yea
* Virginia: Warner (D-VA), Yea Webb (D-VA), Yea
* Washington: Cantwell (D-WA), Yea Murray (D-WA), Yea
* West Virginia: Byrd (D-WV), Yea Rockefeller (D-WV), Yea
* Wisconsin: Feingold (D-WI), Yea Kohl (D-WI), Yea

I fully understand the stop-loss method as a way for companies to address insurance and believe it’s an effective approach to a tough situation. I didn’t perceive SADMILLIE’s approach to be stop-loss so, if I misunderstood that post, I apologize. I took it to be the approach that has resulted in problems with the IRS, as described in the article I linked.

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