Let the Repercussions Begin
Employers
Pennsylvania's Community College of Allegheny County (CCAC) is slashing the hours of 400 adjunct instructors, support staff, and part-time instructors to dodge paying for Obamacare. "It's kind of a double whammy for us because we are facing a legal requirement [under the new law] to get health care and if the college is reducing our hours, we don't have the money to pay for it," said adjunct biology professor Adam Davis. On Tuesday, CCAC employees were notified that Obamacare defines full-time employees as those working 30 hours or more per week and that on Dec. 31 temporary part-time employees will be cut back to 25 hours. The move will save an estimated $6 million. "While it is of course the college’s preference to provide coverage to these positions, there simply are not funds available to do so," said CCAC spokesperson David Hoovler. "Several years of cuts or largely flat funding from our government supporters have led to significant cost reductions by CCAC, leaving little room to trim the college’s budget further."
According to the Orlando Sentinel, Darden Restaurants, Inc., operator of casual dining chains such as Olive Garden, Red Lobster, and LongHorn Steakhouse, is doing just that. ObamaCare requires companies to provide “affordable” health insurance to employees working at least 30 hours per week or pay fines of up to $3,000 per employee who instead obtains taxpayer-subsidized insurance on a state exchange. Darden, therefore, is experimenting with limiting most of its employees to 28 hours per week, thus freeing it from the mandate and its accompanying fine.
Pillar Hotels & Resorts this summer began to focus more on hiring part-time workers among its 5,500 employees, after the Supreme Court upheld the health-care overhaul, said Chief Executive Chris Russell. The company has 210 franchise hotels, under the Sheraton, Fairfield Inns, Hampton Inns and Holiday Inns brands.
Kroger: beginning in January, any employee who is not full-time at that point,will be limited to 28 hours per week and all new hires will be subject to the same policy.
Like many franchisees, Robert U. Mayfield, who owns five Dairy Queens in and around Austin, Tex., is always eager to expand and — no surprise — has had his eyes on opening a sixth DQ. But he said concerns about the new federal health care law had persuaded him to hold off.
Doctors
The study, which appears in the medical-education-themed Dec. 5 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, fuels concerns that there will be a shortage of primary-care doctors available when patients need them most. Researchers surveyed internal medicine residents about their career plans. Of nearly 17,000 third-year residents, only 21.5 percent were planning on a career as an internal medicine doctor. "This is worrisome," said study author Dr. Colin West, an internist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. "In the next decade, we will be 50,000 primary-care physicians short for the needs of the country."Compounding the likely shortage is health care reform under the Affordable Care Act, which is expected to flood the system with new patients in the coming years. "We will need even more primary-care physicians as the foundation of care and we are not generating enough," West said. And, in addition to fewer residents choosing internal medicine and more patients having access to health care, many providers are getting older and heading to retirement.
There is No Such Thing as a Free Lunch
Welcome to the part-time doctorless world of liberal progressives.http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/11/21/Surprise-PA-College-Slashes-Hours-To-Avoid-Obamacare
http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/health-care/item/13160-restaurant-giant-cuts-hours-to-avoid-employer-mandate
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/20/ccac-obamacare_n_2165383.html
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/news/articles/2012/12/04/study-foresees-shortage-of-primary-care-doctors
