Here in New Hampshire, we know how important small businesses are to our state, our economy, and our community. An important source of job growth nationwide, businesses with fewer than 20 employees accounted for 18 percent of private sector jobs in 2006, and nearly 25 percent of employment growth from 1992 to 2005. Far from an exception or an anomaly, small businesses are the backbone of employment and innovation that our country is built on.
However, our small businesses are struggling. Under our current health care system, small businesses are at a severe disadvantage compared to their big business counterparts. Thanks to high broker fees, fixed administrative costs, and a system that favors large corporations over mom and pop stores, small businesses pay up to 18 percent more per worker than large firms for the same health insurance policy. Owners of small businesses, when attempting to provide health coverage for their employees, find themselves faced lower profits, lower wages for their employees, and possible lay offs in order to afford to provide their workers health care.
We believe that this system is broken. We are tired of a health care system that favors large corporations at the expense of the hard working innovators that are the fabric of our local communities. Today in New Hampshire, the combined market share of the top two insurers is 75 percent, a virtual monopoly limiting the options of both our small businesses and our families when it comes to choosing coverage, as well as receiving health care.
We are fed up, and want a system that works for everybody. So, over 120 of our small businesses have signed a petition showing their support for reform, and calling on Sen. Judd Gregg, Sen. Jean Shaheen, Rep. Paul Hodes, and Rep. Carol Shea Porter to enact comprehensive health care reform this year. The principles we support are:
- Affordability, so people can get the care they need without going broke.
- Responsibility, where everyone--employers, individuals and government--participate in paying for health care.
- Choice, so people can keep the health care plan that they have, choose among other private insurance products, or select a public health insurance option.
When our broken health insurance system costs us as much as $710 million this year alone in productivity, we cannot afford to wait another day. From the owner of Atlantic Media, to Zev Yoga, the small businesses of New Hampshire are making a stand. The time for change is now.
Download our petition and see how New Hampshire's small businesses support reform, here:
