>> Some of the job-killer scare stories are based on a deliberate misreading of a Congressional Budget Office report that estimated the law would “reduce the amount of labor used in the economy” by about 800,000 jobs. Sounds like a job-killer, right? Not if you read what the C.B.O. actually wrote.
Without the slightest regard for what CBO did or didn't write, you claim to know about business. So here's a test:
You run one of the thousands upon thousands of small businesses, say a restaurant doing 3.5 Million a year in sales (this is a typical upscale restaurant in a medium-sized city in this country). You hire 58 workers, mostly minimum wage, but your gross payroll runs about 33% of sales. You return a profit margin of 31% of sales.
When Obamacare goes into effect, by law you are required, since you have 50 or more employees, to provide health insurance for your employees at a cost of $5,000 each == $290,000, or 8% of sales, that will reduce your profit margin to 23%.
You are faced with one of several choices:
a) Take an 8 percentage point hit on your profit margin and buy these employees (most of whom will simply not even bother to show up for work if they get a chance at a hot date at 4pm) insurance;
b) You can pay the increased taxes (penalties, whatever) and get nothing in return; or
c) You can find a way to get by with 9 fewer employees.
What will you do?
Note: There IS a correct answer, one that practically every such business will choose. |
