Health Care Act: Navigating Obamacare

"Small groups would affect those under 50 employees," he says. "In reality, these big increases are affecting folks who aren't covered under the health care law. It's kind of an unintended consequence.

"Medical inflation is typically more than double regular inflation; our members commonly report 7 percent to 9 percent health care premium increases," he adds. "That's going to have an impact, particularly on that 2018 requirement for Cadillac plans, super deluxe plans (with a threshold of $10,500 for individuals and $27,000 for families). Those thresholds increase by CPI; they're indexed to inflation, but not medical inflation. By 2020-2021, a lot more companies/plans out there are going to get hit by the Cadillac tax."