An article in Investor’s Business Daily explains how the “Affordable” Care Act is set to lead to major cost increases for American small businesses.
Released into a news black hole last Friday, an official Obama administration report finds that ObamaCare will push premiums up for two-thirds of small businesses. Cross off another ObamaCare promise.
The report came from the actuary for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services — which means it’s from the administration’s official ObamaCare number cruncher.
What it found was that 65% of small businesses that offer insurance will likely see their premiums rise thanks to ObamaCare. That translates into higher insurance costs for 11 million workers.
The reason? These companies generally employ younger, healthier workers and so had been paying lower-than-average rates.
But since ObamaCare bans insurance companies from considering health when setting premiums, these companies will get hit with higher costs.
“We are estimating that 65% of small firms are expected to experience increases in their premium rates,” the report said, “while the remaining 35% are anticipated to have rate reductions.”
The report doesn’t say how big these hikes will be, but we have good reason to believe the extra costs will be significant.
One study, for example, found that 63% of small employers in Wisconsin will see premiums jump 15% because of ObamaCare. A separate study found that 89% of small companies in Maine would see rate hikes of 12% on average.
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