Changes

==Minimum wage criteria==

===General===

The following information taken from [http://www.dol.gov/whd/minwage/q-a.htm (USDL)]

*'''Very small businesses''': Only applies to employees of enterprises that have annual gross volume of sales or business done of at least $500,000 and haven't done business across state lines.

*Nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office compares trade-offs:

**Compared raising the minimum wage to $10.10 and to $9.00. Under the '''$10.10 scenario, there would likely be a reduction of about 500,000 workers across the labor market, as businesses shed jobs, but about 16.5 million low-wage workers would see substantial gains in their earnings in an average week.''' Under the '''$9.00 scenario, the labor force would see a reduction of 100,000 jobs, but an estimated 7.6 million low-wage workers would see a boost in their weekly earnings'''. [http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/44995-MinimumWage.pdf (CBO)]

*Some experts say that '''looking to lower health-care costs significantly isn't realistic for many firms''' and that slowing increases is more realistic. [http://www.cnbc.com/2015/01/08/5-smart-ways-small-firms-can-slash-health-care-costs.html (CNBC)]

**"Reducing your cost over time from one year to the next is probably an unrealistic standard. A company that is keeping its benefits costs in line with its compensation costs is probably doing exactly right." -Alan Cohen, chief strategy officer and co-founder of Liazon

===Ways small businesses can save on healthcare===

Following information from [http://www.cnbc.com/2015/01/08/5-smart-ways-small-firms-can-slash-health-care-costs.html (CNBC)] unless otherwise noted.

====Negotiate private plans====

*Some private insurance premiums are negotiable, especially in the 50-99 employee range.

*A systematic review of 56 published studies of worksite health programs showed that well-implemented workplace health programs can lead to 25% savings each on absenteeism, health care costs, and workers’ compensation and disability management claims costs.

*Only 29 percent of small business owners said they’ve applied for a business loan over the last two years. [http://newsroom.bankofamerica.com/sites/bankofamerica.newshq.businesswire.com/files/press_kit/additional/Fall_2014_Bank_of_America_Small_Business_Owner_Report.pdf (Bank of America)]

**90% of those who applied were approved

*More than half (58%) of Millennial small business owners applied for a business loan within the last two years, nearly twice that of Gen-Xers (30%). '''Friends and family are an important source of funding for Millennial small business owners''', with 30% saying they’ve received a loan from their loved ones in the past. Millennial small business owners are nearly five times as likely as Gen-Xers to have received past funding from a peer-to-peer network, while Boomers (25 %) were more than twice as likely as Millennials (10 %) to have received funding from a home equity loan/other personal debt. [http://newsroom.bankofamerica.com/sites/bankofamerica.newshq.businesswire.com/files/press_kit/additional/Fall_2014_Bank_of_America_Small_Business_Owner_Report.pdf (Bank of America)]

**"Saddled with student loan debt, millennials can't afford to be entrepreneurs," according to 2015 state of entrepreneurship report from the Kauffman Foundation, a nonprofit devoted to studying entrepreneurship.

**Entrepreneurs need equity to invest on their businesses, and loans can affect a budding entrepreneur’s net worth in the short and long term. [http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2014/05/14/young-adults-student-debt-and-economic-well-being/ (PEW Research Center)]