Small Business Needs and Development
Small businesses are the engines of job creation in our economy, including in underserved communities. The critical policy, funding, and other needs of small businesses are a central focus of InSight’s research activities, leveraging PCV’s on-the-ground experience providing financial and advisory resources to social enterprises and entrepreneurs in the Bay Area.
Current Projects
Small Businesses and Health Care
InSight partnered with Lake Research Partners to undertake a comprehensive study on small business owner behavior regarding learning and making decisions about health care. Interviews conducted with 804 California small employers with fewer than 20 workers resulted in these findings. The survey found that California small businesses are more likely to offer health insurance after learning of key provisions in the Affordable Care Act. The survey also revealed that 48 percent of small employers in the state are unaware of provisions in the law that benefit small businesses, such as insurance exchanges and tax credits.
Lake Research Partners provides an initial analysis of the survey’s key findings. A full press release is available here.
Final Report: "Health Care and Small Business: Understanding Health Care Decision Making in California"
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InSight completed the final study and report, "Health Care and Small Business: Understanding Health Care Decision Making in California" (October 2011), which describes small business owner behavior and decision making processes when offering and purchasing health insurance benefits for their employees. The report details the demographics of small business owners in California, how and why they make decisions to offer insurance (or not), who they trust as sources of information about health care, and how likely they are to respond to the new online exchange and tax credit provisions as the Affordable Care Act is rolled out. PCV hopes this new insight will help inform policymakers and advocacy groups about how to effectively implement health care reform and ensure that the policy extends health coverage to more employees of small businesses in a manner that empowers them to access it.
This research is possible with support from The California Endowment.
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A New Way to Talk About Small Business
This project, for the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, makes the case that it is time for academics, policy makers, investors, community leaders, and business owners to have a more fruitful discussion about small business needs. In an effort to create a common language and facilitate policy design, the paper lays out a support structure for small businesses using a simple, but innovative new taxonomy. The research will lead to more efficient models for small business sustainability and job growth as we emerge from the recession.
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