Health insurance coverage is a much sought after benefit that employees look for when they are on the job hunt. After all, it can be expensive to get health coverage on your own, so most insured individuals get coverage through a group medical plan offered by their employer. However, many small businesses find it too expensive to offer a group medical plan to their employees, which puts them at a competitive disadvantage when trying to hire the best people.

The Baltimore Sun had a recent blog post talking about the tax benefits that came about from the recent healthcare reform that are afforded to certain small businesses that offer a group health insurance plan to their employees. While there are certain restrictions that makes some companies ineligible for this tax break, the idea is help small businesses offer health coverage that their employees so desperately want and need.

In a recent Kaiser Family Foundation survey, more than half of the small companies in Maryland with less than 50 employees offer some form of small business employee health insurance coverage. This certainly indicates that there is a need to make employee health insurance plans more affordable for small businesses, which is the idea of this portion of healthcare reform.

There are some restrictions to these tax credits. The company cannot employ more than 25 people and annual salaries cannot exceed $50,000. Also, companies must contribute at least half of the premium for each employees health coverage. Assuming that a small company meets these requirements (check with your accountant to see if your company qualifies for this tax break), it has become more affordable to offer a group medical plan to those that work for you.

To see what a group health insurance policy would cost your company, why don’t you get a free online group health insurance quote from leading insurance carriers. Getting such a quote will not cost you anything and it will give you a good idea of what the premiums would be to cover your employees. Who knows, maybe with these new tax credits (assuming your company is eligible), possibly now is the time to offer a group health plan to your employees.