Small-business owners struggle to afford voluntary benefits like dental, vision, and disability coverage for employees. Over half of U.S. workers would take a 10% pay cut for better benefits. When Aaron's Seattle software company lacked disability insurance, an employee left permanently crippled by a car accident with no financial protection.
Chapters
With the cost of health coverage going up every year, most business owners cannot afford to provide their employees with additional benefits like dental or vision care, life insurance, disability income, critical illness, long-term care, or retirement savings. But these benefits are very important to people. In fact, more than half of American workers say they would quit their job for one with better benefits even if the salary was as much as 10% lower. And those employees who do have better benefits say they would not leave their job for one without those benefits. What's more, when people don't get these benefits through their employment, most don't get them at all, and that puts them at risk for serious financial consequences. For example, Aaron is the owner of a software development company in Seattle, Washington. He provides medical and hospitalization insurance for all of his 28 employees, but no other benefits. So when one of his employees was permanently crippled in a car accident, she had no disability.