Thursday, February 15th, 2007...6:04 am
Well, We’d Be All For Small Business If They Had Slicker Lobbyists Like Those Insurance Companies
When I was running for state legislature, I was interviewed by a couple of small business organizations. One thing that they all seemed to support was Healthcare Group, a public-private partnership that offers small businesses a way to purchase health insurance for their employees. The program has been largely successful. Even though some initial funding came from the state, the program has sustained itself entirely through member’s dues for nearly two years.
The program was passed (by a Republican legislature, by the way) because small buisinesses wanted to be able to buy affordable insurance for their employees. Because a single small buisisness has, by definition, few employees, they often lack the numbers necessary to buy the cheaper insurance that larger companies can. Even though we are talking about a group that for the most part can’t buy insurance now, the plan has met with resistance from the insurance industry.
Still, even though the program seems to be a success, a relatively small number of Arizonans (roughly 25,000 according to Healthcare group’s website) are covered by it despite the large number of Arizonans who work for buisnesses that are eligible for membership. One big reason is the “bare period,” where a buisiness has to leave its employees unprotected by insurance for six months before they can be eligbile for the program. So, a small buisiness has to either buy into a more expensive insurance program and be ineligible for membership in Healthcare Group, or leave its employees uninsured. Observers say that this “bare period” was put in to quell the concerns from insurance companies who didn’t want to have to compete with the lower priced plan.
(Maybe the “bare period” was put in as a faith based initiative: it forces small employers to pray that their employees not get sick. So many saints it would be hard to figure out who to invoke: St. Peregrine against skin diseases, St. Blaise against throat diseases, St. Casimir against the bubonic plague…)
Attempts to rid the program of this “bare period” have been turned back time and time again. In the current session, the bill (HB2727) is being pushed by a coalition of Republican and Democratic members, and it has yet to get a hearing.
There have been moves by some of the leadership, notably Tom Boone, to ditch the program all together. So, here is a program that benefits small buisiness, that is self-funded and the Republicans still want to get rid of it? Wait, I thought y’all were the party of small buisiness?
NB - No, former legislative candidate Horst Kraus had nothing to do with the naming of the “bare period.”
1 Comment
February 15th, 2007 at 8:42 am
I am confused. Boone’s web page says he’s the exec. dir. of the Valley Schools Insurance Trust. Isn’t that an insurance pool for schools similar to what Healthcare Group is for small businesses?
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