For owners paying full freight in 2026
USA OPS compares your current path against a large-group path in about sixty seconds. If the math holds, book discovery. If it does not, stay where you are.
See the whole path first, then run your number when you are ready.
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Two paths
Coverage costs too much and gets worse every year. The reason to move depends on whether you run alone or carry employees.
Path 1
You own a U.S. business with no employees. You clear about $80,000 a year or more, and you pay about $700 a month or more for your own coverage.
Path 2
One employee or twenty-five, the health plan is only part of what you carry. Payroll, workers' comp, HR, compliance, employee changes, unemployment claims, and multi-state rules are part of the load.
Timing
The enhanced credits that capped marketplace premiums expired at the end of 2025. For 2026 the original rule is back in force: earn more than about $62,600 as a single filer in the lower 48 states and the marketplace premium tax credit can fall away. No phase-out above that line.
If you are already over that line and paying full price, here is the quiet cost. You are paying with after-tax dollars, and there is no going back to recover what you overpaid. The structure's tax benefit starts the day it is in effect, not the day you file. Every month you wait closes under your current path.
If you are still taking an advance credit this year on an income estimate, read this twice. If your income lands above the line, you can be required to pay the entire credit back when you file, and for 2026 there is no cap on that repayment. That is the rude surprise at tax time, and it is avoidable.
None of this is a reason to rush a bad decision. It is a reason to run your number now, while the year is still yours to shape, and bring a real result to your CPA.
Why 2026
When the enhanced help expired, it did not land on everyone evenly. The owners who earn enough to lose every dollar of subsidy took the steepest increase of all. If that is you, the averages below are context. Your own number is the decision.
Average across the marketplace. Source: KFF, 2026.
Average across the marketplace. Source: KFF, 2026.
A 60-year-old over the income cliff now pays about $865 more a month for the same plan. Source: KFF, 2026.
Those are marketplace averages. Over the income cliff there is no subsidy left to soften the jump, so the real number can run higher.
National context
The 2026 cost shock made national news. USA OPS is not affiliated with or endorsed by any outlet, and national coverage is context only. The useful answer is still your own number.
It is real, it is everywhere, and it is not slowing down. The only number that matters now is what it did to yours. That takes about sixty seconds.
Math first
Most brokers take your contact information first and show you a number later, if at all. We do it the other way, on purpose.
Take sixty seconds and answer one page of questions. You will see a screen with your personal tax impact, built on your number, federal and your state's rules, measured against current PEO rates. If that number is in your favor, open the full report and send it to your CPA or financial adviser for confirmation.
If you carry a team, the report includes a configurator. Set your headcount and see, line by line, what the PEO would cost to run your people. When the numbers satisfy you, we book a short discovery call to settle the unknowns and your workers' comp, send you to the underwriter for a formal quote, and start moving you over. The platform is everyday software many PEOs already use. You are not locked into anything.
No fee and no contact for the first result. New to PEOs? See how getting started works.
Why us
You already get pitched by brokers, payroll companies, HR platforms, benefits vendors, and other PEOs. That is exactly why we lead with the decision instead of the pitch.
Three questions decide this, and the calculator is built to answer them before anyone asks for your name:
Plenty of vendors can sell coverage. We prove it pays first, on numbers your CPA can check, before you hand over a thing.
Trust
Math first is the only honest way to sell this. If your current coverage wins, stay where you are. That is why the first result has to tell you when staying put is better.
We are not the carrier, the PEO, your CPA, or your attorney. We qualify the fit, run the math, show you the comparison, and connect you with the PEO partner when the numbers hold. A separate licensed provider runs the plan.
Run the number
If you clear about $80,000 a year and pay about $700 a month or more for coverage, your number is worth sixty seconds. Run it before a sales call, before you share contact information, before you give us your name.
No fee and no contact for the first result.
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