Administration highlights business healthcare tax credits in Obama budget

President Obama's proposed budget would expand the health law's healthcare tax credits by about $14 billion over a decade, the administration highlighted Thursday.

Under the law, companies with 25 or fewer workers that pay for at least half of employees' healthcare coverage can claim progressively higher tax credits (up to 50 percent starting in 2014). 

The president's budget would increase the size of eligible companies to those with 50 or fewer workers, make it more generous and make it easier to claim.

Karen Mills, the administrator of the Small Business Administration, said the budget provision would help an extra 500,000 businesses cover four million workers. 

"The Small Business Health Care Tax Credit has benefited hundreds of thousands of small businesses since the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010," Mills wrote in a blog post. "After listening to business owners around the country, the President is proposing to make the tax credit available to more businesses and easier to claim."

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