William Heroman Jr, CEO of Billy Heroman’s Flowers, is being forced to cut his employees’ workers due to the high cost of Obamacare.
Heroman’s company has provided health insurance for its employees for nearly 60 years and they plan on continuing to provide it, at least for full-time employees.
"The easy thing for me to do as a businessman is to say ‘You know what? We’re going to quit paying.’ It’s $3000 a year (the first year) as a fine. I’ll pay a lot more than that in their insurance," he told WBRZ-LA.
His company is now hiring more part-time employees. Under the Obamacare law, businesses are not required to provide health insurance for part-time employees up to 30 hours per week.
Heroman said, "Cutting back to hiring 30 hours…we’ve had to do that, and it’s horrible, I hate having to do that, but it’s so uncertain and you don’t know what’s coming that for right now, you need to kind of stay there until you can sort it all out."
The Director at the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry says that many businesses are changing their insurance plans and Obamacare is to blame.
Renee Amar, Director of LABI, revealed: "Their agents are coming back saying ‘What I can do for you now is maybe we’re going to double your deductible, so it used to be $5000 for your family, now your families are going to have a $10,000 deductible and your premiums are going to increase. It’s actually less coverage for them that’s costing them more."
Heroman says many employees are worried because they cannot afford any health insurance plans available through Obamacare and they will instead pay a fine.
He fears that employees will be forced to get second jobs, but those jobs will likely be part-time jobs that will not provide health insurance.