Sorry to hear of your problem. I always look for your input in this forum and have appreciated your (and everyone else's) input to my questions.
I hope you and everyone else is able to resolve this problem. Another example to the physicians you mentioned is my own. I had a private practice in CA, specializing in neuropsychology and head trauma. In addition to my insurance premiums going up, my insurance payments went down or the patient's coverage was completely eliminated. Apparently, once the bleeding stops the problems are resolved. However, my responsiblilties/liability continues on, even to the point it is recommended that I make arrangements in my will for someone to take over my records etc!
The effort to cover every eventuality, real or imagined, is become absurd. That is what drove me out of private practice. My real passion is metal work, but I have avoided anything that would leave me at risk and stay with art-metal or related.
I will be following this issue with great interest.
The problem of the high costs of doing business, which includes insurance costs, is widespread throughout our nation, I believe. In some states like my home state of California costs have gotten out of hand. Every week we read about companies large and small fleeing to other states or other countries. The nastiest form of cancer that has been throttling businesses in California has been workman's compensation insurance. WC premiums have been skyrocketing year after year here - in some years premiums have increased 100% over those of the previous year for certain industries. A couple of months ago, for example, I watched part of a TV program about one of California's family-owned timber companies. I missed the first half of the program and didn't hear how many employees worked for the company. I did hear, however, that the company had 16,000 acres of timber. In 2002 the company's president was honored with an award for excellence in the way he managed his forests and saw mill. What later stunned me, however, was his wife's discussion about their workman's compensation premiums. I don't recall the exact figures for each year but these were their approximate WC premiums:
1999 - $250,000/year
2000 - $325,000
2001 - $450,000
2002 - $625,000
2003 - $750,000
She then stated that they were informed recently that their WC premium for 2004 amounted to $1,600,000! And theirs was a company with an excellent safety record. I said "was" because she said that after receiving this notification, they gathered all of their employees and told them that they could not afford to remain in business. They were shutting down the company in 90 days! Terminator Schwarzenegger, our new governor, is trying hard to reduce the costs of doing business in California but I personally feel he's fighting a hopeless battle. Just before he took office, for example, our liberal legislature passed legislation that mandates all businesses with 50 or more employees to provide health insurance for their employees. As I recall, employers will be required to pay 80% of the cost of health insurance. Last week I read that our legislature is considering a bill to increase the State's minimum wage by $1 per hour. Chambers of commerce and businesses statewide have denounced this legislation because it will force businesses to lay off employees in order to keep costs under control. Notwithstanding these complaints, I won't be surprised if our give-away legislature passes the legislation. What doesn't surprise me is the fact that for the past 3 years California's population has been declining as more and more people (taxpayers) have been emigrating to other states.
Off topic but in a closely related vein: as a budding manufacturer myself I can understand why US manufacturers have been outsourcing their production. You can learn some of the reasons why in the following article (sit down because it's a long one):
http://www.nam.org/s_nam/sec.asp?CID=201308&DID=229450
Maybe it's like car insurance, they figure you are a higher risk because you never had any claims and the longer you go without one, the higher the risk of having one? I dunno. I have heard of insurance companies making a mistake.
Forum
