If you own a small business, or you know someone who does, you (or they) need to check out this little-reported feature of the health care bill:
The Small Business Health Care Tax Credit can cover up to 35 percent of the premiums a small business pays to cover its workers. In 2014, the rate will increase to 50 percent.
Writing at the HuffPo, Linda Bergthold uses Salt Lake City bookstore owner Betsy Burton as a mini-case study to shine a spotlight on this provision, which is “a tax credit for businesses who have fewer than 25 employees with average wages of less than $50,000 a year.”
Ironically, [Burton] only found out the specifics when a reporter from AP called her for a quote on an article he was writing about how “bad” health reform was for small business. When he heard that she was actually interested in finding out how much she could save, he helped her calculate the savings she could get, and she was astonished. She could get a credit of $21,000 for 2010 health insurance costs, reducing her payroll costs to $50,000, a significant and real reduction. (You can find out your potential tax credit by going to the IRS website (pdf) or the Small Business Majority website that helps you calculate what you might save.) Betsy decided she could afford to stay in business after all.
More from the New York Times (which also interviews Burton).
Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com