Small Businesses Concerned About Rise in Healthcare Insurance

It looks as if small businesses are about to take another hit.

Critics of Obama's healthcare reform law are claiming the Health Insurance Tax (HIT), included as part of the law, will cost small businesses and their employees billions of dollars in fees.

According to the National Federation of Independent Business, the cost of health insurance is the No. 1 issue facing small business owners today. And with healthcare reform looming, the NFIB, which opposed the new law, fears the costs will only rise.

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Forty-three percent of small companies with less than 50 employees now offer health insurance to their employees while 96 percent of small firms with more than 50 employees offer health insurance, according to the NFIB.

However, because they are small, small businesses pay on average 18 percent more for health insurance than their larger counterparts for the same group of services.

According to the Small Business Administration, small companies (under 500 employees) represent 99.7 percent of all employers and employ about half of U.S. workers.

With healthcare costs predicted to rise under the reforms, small business owners now providing health insurance for employees will be forced to drop coverage, according to the NFIB, thus multiplying the millions of Americans without healthcare coverage.

What steps do you think the country should take to avert this crisis? Tell us in the "Comments" section.