My family is celebrating our twenty-first year in business with Wayside Family
Restaurant. We started in 1992 with only five employees at our first restaurant
in North Carolina, but over the past two decades we have grown to 120 workers
across three locations and a catering business. Growing our business has been
an amazing, rewarding experience, yet in the past couple of years the cost of
doing business has steadily increased. One example is the cost of health care
for our employees – it keeps rising and come January that cost is going to
throw a wrench in what we are doing at Wayside Family Restaurant.
A major issue is the health insurance tax (HIT) included in the health care reform law passed by Washington lawmakers several years ago. Come next year, the
government will tax health insurance companies upwards of $100 billion over the
next ten years for plans held in the fully insured marketplace. Since 88 percent
of small businesses purchase their healthcare insurance in the fully insured
market, my family and the workers we employ will bear the burden of this
increased cost.
How will this affect my family’s business? For one, we are not going to be able to
add new employees. To manage the impact of this tax we are likely going to have
to reduce the hours for many of our employees. That will allow us to not have
to pay the increased healthcare premium. It’s our belief that the HIT is going
to cause prices everywhere to increase, and this will result in the economy
having less money, which will eventually result in businesses suspending hiring
or even shutting their doors. I foresee another recession ahead unless we get a
handle on these runaway healthcare costs.
The effects of the HIT will be felt everywhere. Beginning in 2014, former CBO
Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin estimates the HIT alone will raise a family’s
premiums by $500 a year. President Obama has said that the new healthcare law
would lower the average family’s premiums by $2,500, but health insurance
premiums have actually been steadily rising for the past decade, including the
three years since the new healthcare law has been passed.
What we need is to repeal the HIT so that my family’s business can move forward
without crippling health insurance costs. Encourage your Member of Congress to
sign legislation to stop this burdensome tax on small business.
Chris Measmer
Owner
Wayside Family Restaurant
Oakboro, North Carolina