What Could Healthcare Do For American Business?

[Texsox]

Given a scenario that a health care bill is passed and that most/all Americans will now have their health coverage independent from their jobs. What happens from there?

 

I am believing that once employees are freed from the need to work for companies that offer health insurance, many employees will opt to work for smaller, more innovative companies, who are less likely to outsource to foreign companies. I see a real surge in mom and pop and middle sized business. All in all, I see this as a boom for American business.

[Balta1701]

Given a scenario that a health care bill is passed and that most/all Americans will now have their health coverage independent from their jobs. What happens from there?

 

I am believing that once employees are freed from the need to work for companies that offer health insurance, many employees will opt to work for smaller, more innovative companies, who are less likely to outsource to foreign companies. I see a real surge in mom and pop and middle sized business. All in all, I see this as a boom for American business.

Amongst the many bits of data I've posted in threads recently was this one...that the American Small Business sector, supposedly the engine of job growth in this country, is comparatively much smaller than the small business sectors of all but 1 of the other countries in the OECD.

The study, “An International Comparison of Small Business Employment,” reviews the most recently available, internationally comparable data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to measure the share of small businesses in 22 rich democracies. The report finds:

 

* The United States has the second lowest share of self-employed workers (7.2 percent).

* The United States has among the lowest shares of employment in small businesses in manufacturing - only 11.1 percent of the U.S. manufacturing workforce is in enterprises with fewer than 20 employees. Eighteen other rich countries have a higher share of manufacturing employment in small enterprises, including Germany (13.0 percent), Sweden (14.4 percent), and France (18.0 percent).

* U.S. small businesses are particularly weak in high-tech. The United States, for example, has the second lowest share of computer-related service employment in firms with fewer than 100 employees and the third lowest share of research and development related employment in firms with fewer than 100 employees.

Health care costs almost certainly play in to this. They are a huge impediment to being able to start your own business; without the negotiating power of being in a large employer pool, the costs of health care are much higher.