|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Small and mid-sized businesses are the backbone of the Bay Area economy. From local restaurants and tech startups to home health providers and construction firms, these businesses create jobs, fuel innovation and strengthen our communities.
A big part of that commitment includes offering health care coverage to employees — a benefit that helps businesses attract and retain talent, support employee well-being and give families peace of mind.
But that coverage is under threat.
Right now, state lawmakers are advancing a series of proposals that would drive up health care costs for California employers. Between costly new health care mandates and the state’s proposed expansion of Essential Health Benefits (EHBs), businesses are facing nearly $1 billion in higher premium costs.
While these well-intentioned proposals may expand access on paper, in practice, they risk pricing employers out of the ability to offer health care coverage to their employees altogether.
For small businesses, those added costs don’t just disappear. They show up in higher monthly premiums, larger deductibles and steeper out-of-pocket expenses.
In reality, many employers may be forced to delay hiring, scale back benefits or stop offering health care coverage completely.
That’s bad news for workers. Here in the Bay Area, where the cost of living is already sky-high, employer-sponsored health care is one of the few ways families can afford the care they need. If employers can’t afford to provide coverage, it becomes much more difficult for workers to afford access to preventive care, chronic disease management and maintain the kind of stability that keeps families healthy and financially secure.
The root of the problem is simple: there’s too little focus on affordability. Lawmakers are moving forward with new health coverage mandates, often without fully considering their costs and impact.
Each mandate may sound reasonable in isolation, but their combined effect adds up quickly. For small businesses, the financial pressure becomes unsustainable.
Small and mid-sized businesses can’t just absorb major cost increases year after year. And yet, they’re the ones who will be squeezed the hardest by these proposals.
If we’re serious about expanding access to care, we need to get serious about keeping it affordable. The solution lies in policymakers having the stomach to oppose all new health care mandates which impact businesses.
Business leaders across the state have come together to form the California Businesses for Affordable Health Care coalition. I am a member. The coalition urges lawmakers to listen to the voices of employers who are doing everything they can to support their workforce, and asking them to stop advancing policies that make it harder for them to do so.
We all want a healthier California, but mandates that push health care out of reach won’t get us there.
It’s time for lawmakers to put affordability and jobs first.
Editor’s note: Judy Lloyd, founder and president of Altamont Communications Strategies, is a small business owner in Danville who serves on the California Leadership Council for the National Federation of Independent Business. She is a coalition partner with California Businesses for Affordable Health Care.
