Beginning in 2015, companies with more than 50 employees will be forced to offer healthcare coverage or pay penalties.
Moving company, Two Men and a Truck, is one such company.
WRAL-NC reported of the company’s struggle with Obamacare. Four of the company’s locations are in North Carolina. Each of the locations is run independently and employs about 30 workers. Common ownership rules mandate that the four locations be grouped together, thus pushing Two Men and a Truck over the 50 employee threshold. Two Men and a Truck will thus be forced to provide healthcare to their employees at a staggering cost.
Noril Thompson, a driver for the moving company, told WRAL-NC: "You never know what might happen in the future. If you don’t have any kind of health insurance, it might be hard to get things taken care of." Thompson and the office staff receive health insurance from Two Men and a Truck. The company offers it to its employees by paying half of the cost. Only 30 percent of employees have made use of the offered health insurance. The company anticipates that next year, 100 percent of its employees will be a part of their health insurance plan because Obamacare will force them to pay penalties if they are not enrolled in some type of health insurance.
"We anticipate our costs to be increased about $250,000-$275,000 a year" with Obamacare, Brooke Wilson, co-owner of the moving company, revealed. The company will be insuring more employees at a higher premium. They will not receive any discounts for their young, healthy male employees because gender and health status do not factor into health pricing.
Asked by WRAL-NC how the company will make up for the astronomical cost of the healthcare they will be forced to offer, Wilson said: "Unfortunately, I think it’s going to limit our ability to expand the business, we may not be able to add as many trucks to our fleet, we may not be able to open another location."
Citing the importance of the employee culture the company strives to maintain, Wilson vowed that the company will not cut hours, wages, or employees.