Prometheus 6

Want to see what the feds mean when they say "small business"?

SBA has several general Size Standards. A business in one of the following industry groups is small if it is not greater than the size standard indicated.

Industry Group	Size Standard
Manufacturing	500 employees
Wholesale Trade	100 employees
Agriculture	$750,000
Retail Trade	$6.5 million
General & Heavy Construction (except Dredging)	$31 million
Dredging	$18.5 million
Special Trade Contractors	$13 million
Travel Agencies	$3.5 million (commissions & other income)
Business and Personal Services Except:	$6.5 million
Architectural, Engineering, Surveying, and Mapping Services	$4.5 million
Dry Cleaning and Carpet Cleaning Services	$4.5 million

If the size of a business exceeds the size standard for its overall industry group, it may still be a small business for the specific NAICS industry in that group. Some industries have higher size standards than the general one for the industry group. SBA has a Table of Size Standards on its web site.

Many of the Self-Employed Are Simply on Their Own
By MILT FREUDENHEIM

The small businesses that struggle the most with health insurance may be the smallest of all: those with only one employee.

In 11 states, self-employed people have some of the same legal rights as small companies when it comes to dealing with insurers: Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Maine, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Rhode Island and Vermont.

But elsewhere, in dealing with insurance companies, the nation’s estimated 20 million self-employed are on their own.

In Virginia, a state with relatively few controls on insurance rates, Clay Williams, a 59-year-old self-employed real estate agent in Falls Church, said the cost of health insurance for himself, his wife and two sons, had tripled in six years. After it ballooned last year to $1,956 a month, he angrily refused to renew.

When he shopped for a new insurer, one company rejected his 20-year-old son, a student, because six months earlier he had had mononucleosis, a common disease on college campuses.

Another company would have set limits on the coverage Mr. Williams could buy. And it planned to raise the annual deductible because of his age and his noncancerous prostate problem.

Mr. Williams finally decided last May to go with an Aetna plan with a deductible of $8,250 and monthly premiums of $680. Last December, he said, he was notified that the monthly rate would jump 27 percent, to $864, on Feb. 1.

Then, a few weeks ago, he said, the company told him it had incorrectly recorded his wife’s application and was again raising the monthly premium, to $1,020.

Aetna confirmed Mr. Williams’s version of events.

“As an individual,” Mr. Williams said, “I have absolutely no clout. What’s my payment going to be in six years — $4,000 a month?”