Results Video, Inc. | El Paso, Texas

Texas Small Business Owner: Exchanges Can Help Country Move Forward

Maria Clay-Emerson
Results Video, Inc.
El Paso, Texas

Founded: 1991
Full-time employees: 4
Health Coverage: PPO

Maria Clay-Emerson has reason to be proud. She has offered health coverage to employees for 16 of her video production company, Video Results, Inc.’s 2o years in business.

Today’s healthcare market, however, poses a grave threat to Maria’s firm commitment to employer-offered health insurance. Without federal healthcare reform’s health insurance exchanges, which will be set up in 2014 and are designed to curb costs and give small groups like hers a place to pool their purchasing power, Maria might soon face a situation where the high costs of coverage could render her unable to continue offering it. That “would be simply unacceptable after all these years,” she said.

Since 1995, Maria has purchased health insurance through nearly every major carrier on the market, and no matter whom the insurer, her group’s costs shoot up every year as the quality of the benefits go down. She’s devoted enough to her employees to prioritize finding the most comprehensive and least expensive PPO plan out there so her workers can see providers at home and on vacation. She takes time to research the increasingly temperamental market each year before deciding which plan will work for her and her employees. Were coverage more affordable, the valuable time spent finding a new carrier could be spent on her business. Not to mention that despite bargain shopping, premiums continually increase and she loses cash that could have been spent creating new jobs.

“The entire process is very inefficient and takes time away from business.”

Regardless of Maria’s dedicated efforts to choose the right plans, she still hits a brick wall when it comes to finding affordable plans with sufficient benefits. Premiums are nearly $500 per employee per month, and their PPO has a hefty deductible. Maria and her 4 employees are lucky enough to be spared from especially inflated costs by having good health. Nonetheless, the group’s plan left one employee, who already pays 25% of his own premium and the full premium for his spouse, facing the full $3,000 deductible for routine childbirth (the total cost of the delivery was $7,000). The couple chose to avoid the financial blow they’d incur by meeting the steep deductible. Since they are young and healthy, they opted to have a home birth that thankfully went smoothly.

“It’s disappointing when you’re an employer and want to offer good insurance but it’s not even affordable enough for an employee to have a baby.”

Maria’s take on the Affordable Care Act’s 2014 health insurance exchanges is this: “Companies, employers, employees—everyone, really—will benefit.” These online marketplaces where “companies can join forces and negotiate better rates” will allow hardworking small business owners like Maria to afford the coverage they’ve always wanted for employees they value. Situations like that of the proud new parent will no longer cause Maria or others like her to have sleepless nights, wondering what they could do differently as employers to ensure their employees are covered. Maria takes pride in offering insurance and deserves to keep that pride. She envisions the exchanges as tools that can help small business owners across the nation solve their burdensome financial woes.