Illinois Small Businesses Stand to Benefit from Health Care Reform

By Kevin Robinson in News on Jul 22, 2010 4:40PM

A new report from Families USA, a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit that pushed for the recent health care reform suggests that nearly 80 percent of Illinois small businesses will benefit from a tax credit in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The tax credit, which targets small businesses that employ 25 people or less, help pay the cost of employee coverage. In Illinois, this means 159,900 small businesses will qualify. Of those that qualify, nearly a third will be eligible for the full tax credit of 35 percent. These are Illinois businesses that employ 10 or fewer people who earn, on average $25,000 or less. Typically these are the businesses that have had the most difficulty affording health insurance. As the number of employees and their average wage increases, the tax credit decreases on a sliding scale.

Crains' Chicago Business quoted Gary Apelian, treasurer of the family-owned Apelian Carpets & Orientals in Evanston as saying that “I think this is giving (small businesses) an incentive to try to work things out, instead of just putting in a super-high deductible and having employees only go to the doctor only for something catastrophic.”