Across the country, premiums have more than doubled in the last decade, with smaller companies particularly hard hit in recent years, federal officials say.
In New Hampshire, where the population is among the healthiest in the nation, according to various surveys, the insurance market for individuals, families and small businesses is extremely fragile. More than 90 percent of private employers in New Hampshire have fewer than 50 employees. Small and medium-size employers try to shop around for health insurance, but have few alternatives from which to choose.
This year, groups of more than 20 workers have been experiencing premium increases of around 20 percent, insurance agents say, while smaller groups are seeing increases of 40 percent to 60 percent or more.
“The rate of increase is phenomenal,” said Jean Pierre La Tourette, owner of Flora Ventures, a florist with 11 employees in Newmarket, N.H., near Portsmouth. When he was recently notified that the monthly premium for single employees at his firm was going up by $229, or 40 percent, to $789, Mr. La Tourette said, he felt “a combination of anger and frustration....
James D. Bell Jr., the president of the EPE Corporation, which assembles electronic circuit boards at its factory here, said health insurance trends were starkly different from those of his other business expenses.
“Everywhere else I see a decrease in costs as a percentage of sales when the business grows,” Mr. Bell said. “We can buy raw circuit boards from hundreds of suppliers in the United States and overseas. But only two or three health plans make serious bids for our business.”
In an effort to save money last year, Mr. Zaremba’s company, RAM Printing, chose a health plan that required employees to pay more of the cost. The added expense had an immediate impact.
“I took a 5 percent cut in pay, because of the economy, and I was paying more for health care at the same time,” said Gary J. Silveira, a longtime print shop employee. “We still owe $1,000 to ourfamily doctor; I’m paying $100 a month. I’m three months overdue in paying physical therapists who treated my son. And I skipped a few months of blood pressure and cholesterol medications just to save money.”
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