Q: Will I be required to provide coverage that I can’t afford?

You won't be required to provide health insurance to your employees, but if you choose to, new tax credits will make covering your employees more affordable. You will also have access to a new insurance exchange to find the best deal, and the entire process will be simpler.

A: No.

The President’s proposal does not require that small businesses provide coverage to their employees. Instead, the President’s proposal provides tens of billions of dollars in new tax-credits to small businesses to make it easier for them to provide coverage if they choose to do so.
Today, small businesses pay up to 18 percent more than large firms for the same health insurance policy. The independent and non-partisan Congressional Budget Office found that with health insurance reform, premiums for small businesses will go down.
In addition, you will be protected from sudden, arbitrary rate hikes because a worker get sick; because insurance companies will no longer be permitted to base the cost of coverage on health status.
Starting in 2014, only large businesses who have employees receiving taxpayer-funded health assistance will pay an assessment to help offset the cost of those subsidies to the American taxpayer. Companies whose employees are receiving taxpayer assistance will have to pay $2,000 per full-time worker. (This is less than half of the annual cost of providing health insurance to a full-time worker today). A business is defined as “large” if it has more than 50 full-time equivalent workers, not counting seasonal workers. The first 30 workers would be subtracted from the total when calculating the total amount of the assessment. We estimate that fewer than 2 per cent of large businesses will be likely to pay these penalties.