Misplaced Bitterness over Business

I'm getting all kinds of stories in my news feed of employers laying off people because they think the Affordable Care Act is going to destroy business--or, rather, they're using that assumption as an excuse to fire people who don't agree with them. An anonymous caller to C-Span--he said he was "Stu," from Williamson, Georgia, where he owns a "relatively small aviation service company"--described how he reduced the hours of his part-time workers so that he would not have to comply with what he claims he would be required to do under the Affordable Care Act, offer health care to part-time employees who work 30 hours a week. And he says that he fired two people whom he suspected had voted for Obama!

Where do people like this come from? Mordor?

According to a government information flyer for small businesses:

the health care law does not require businesses to provide insurance. For businesses with fewer than 50 full-time and full-time equivalent employees, there are no consequences for not providing health insurance. (quotes here and below from "Small Businesses and the Affordable Care Act," a link to which can be found on the Health.gov website: Newsroom: Brochures, Posters, and Outreach")

In addition, the on-line brochure calms the small business owner's fear of higher taxes associated with the Affordable Care Act:

There are no new taxes on small employers in the law. The health care law does not require any business to provide health insurance for their employees. However, starting in 2014, a large employer may have to pay an assessment if it does not offer affordable insurance and one of its employees gets tax credits to purchase insurance in the Exchange. These assessments do not apply to businesses with less than 50 employees. Large employers that do not offer health benefits coverage at all may be required to pay an assessment of $2,000 per year for each full- time employee, excluding the first 30 full-time employees.  Larger employers that do offer health benefits coverage that is unaffordable or lacks minimum value may be assessed a payment of $3,000 per year for each full-time employee receiving federal financial assistance. However, this payment cannot exceed the assessment the business would pay if it did not offer health care coverage. 

Note: the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services estimates that fewer than 2% of large American employers will have to pay these assessments.

Small business owners can also find more information here-- "Small Business and the Affordable Care Act," or on the IRS website, here-- "Small Business Health Care Tax Credit for Small Employers."

But, no, instead, small business owners such as Stu, who are disappointed that their presidential candidate did not win, would rather respond in ignorance and take out their bitterness on other people than face facts: the re-election of Barack Obama is not going to cause businesses to fail. The bone-headedness of business owners might, though.

These kinds of bitter, malicious, and vindictive responses to the re-election of President Barack Obama astound me.  

More on Business Owners from Mordor:
"Coal CEO Prays for Deliverance from Obama, Fires Workers," by Mark Joseph Stern, in Slate, 9 November 2012.