At his two Rib & Loin restaurants, Yogi Center is used to serving generous portions of pork with all the fixings.
But even to Mr. Center, the historic health care reform package adopted this week by Congress is a lot to swallow all at once. Like many small employers, he is still hungry for more information about how tax credits, insurance exchanges and individual and business mandates might change his cost and availability of health care.
“We’re going to do what we can for our employees if it doesn’t break us or make us have to go up in price. But we’re a small business, and we can’t get out of balance with our prices or costs,” said Mr. Center, whose restaurants in Hixson and Brainerd don’t offer employee health insurance.
Among America’s 29.6 million small businesses such as Rib & Loin, there are still more questions than answers from the sweeping changes included in the 2,700-page Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the companion Reconciliation Act of 2010.
For employers who don’t offer health insurance, the package eventually will offer tax breaks worth up to half the cost of adding health care coverage for low- and middle-income workers.