Obamacare: Obama won so I fired 22 employees

[_EAllusion]

So, first he tries to blackmail his employees into voting for Romney, then he has a hissy fit when the election doesn't go his way and lays off employes over costs he hasn't even incurred yet. No wonder the republican party is on the way out.

says the guy who never had to employ anyone

I have about 70 people employed underneath me that I'm directly responsible for that are funded by program budgets that I manage. At no point has it occurred to anyone at my business that I know of that we need to layoff anyone because of costs associated with Obama-care. They're just not that much.

His action is nuts. Do you employ people?

This guy is being a dick or irrational. Maybe he needs to layoff people for other reasons and is just taking the opportunity to do so to make a political point / threat.

[_EAllusion]

I was constantly being asked over the last couple of years how to get around the $2500 limit on Medical FSA's

The halving of the cap on FSA is going to hit some people's pocketbooks to the tune of hundreds of dollars, but that doesn't at all explain why anyone would need to lay off 22 people. One does not follow the other in any way.

[_Kevin Graham]

This guy is being a dick or irrational. Maybe he needs to layoff people for other reasons.

Yes, I suspected the same. Probably just trying to make a political statement in his frustration of the election results. Yesterday in the morning I was listening to the Neal Boortz show and he was telling a story about a friend who said he is firing five employees because of the election. And he made sure he fired those employees who had Obama stickers on their bumpers.

None of this makes sense.

[_EAllusion]

And he made sure he fired those employees who had Obama stickers on their bumpers.

Well that's extremely illegal. I have hard enough time firing people for abject incompetence. Labor law is tough. If this is at all true, he opened himself up to a massive civil suit.

[_cinepro]

The halving of the cap on FSA is going to hit some people's pocketbooks to the tune of hundreds of dollars, but that doesn't at all explain why anyone would need to lay off 22 people. One does not follow the other in any way.

Honestly, that guy was either lying or not telling the whole story.

The only reason he would need to lay off 20% of his workforce today is if he had a huge decrease in work coming in. If he were profitable with 114 employees on Monday, then Obama getting elected wouldn't change that by Thursday, or next week, or even next month. And if he weren't profitable before Obama's election, then it's not the election's fault.

Like I said, it looks like Obamacare will be making a huge impact and could increase costs for small businesses by tens of thousands of dollars, but those costs won't be here until 2014.

I suspect in the end I'll be coping with the costs through a combination of fewer employees (to get below 50), reduced employee pay to share the costs with them, increased costs to my clients (where possible), and lower profit.

I may even go so far as to split my company into two separate companies to keep my headcount below 50 at each location (I have two locations that perform different work for different clients, so it would be entirely logical to do so anyway), but I'm still looking at how feasible that would be.

[Guest]

And he made sure he fired those employees who had Obama stickers on their bumpers.

Well that's extremely illegal. I have hard enough time firing people for abject incompetence. Labor law is tough. If this is at all true, he opened himself up to a massive civil suit.

Nope. Political parties aren't a protected class.

An individual may be in a protected class due to their race, color, gender, religious beliefs, national origin, disability, genetic information, pregnancy, or veteran status.

http://www.shrm.org/TemplatesTools/hrqa ... class.aspx

So unless the Obama supporters want to argue that they have a disability, or Obama is their religious figure, fire away!

[_Res Ipsa]

Cinepro, that makes sense to me. For any business just above the 50 employee cap that currently doesn't provide health insurance to employees, it makes sense to restructure in some way to get under the cap. It sounds like your business is in the range where the ACA will impact how you structure your business.

ETA: was replying to two posts back. But I also agree with you on the firing. At least in an at will state.

[_Droopy]

Bottom line, for the economically literate, the employee mandate (which is unconstitutional on its face in any case) creates incentives for employers to avoid those massive 2,000 fines by getting rid of those workers, who are now liabilities, or shunting them (or hiring) into part-time positions and downsizing operations and doing with less.

Obamacare also raises the minimum productivity required of less skilled workers to hold a full-time job.

Second are the massive new taxes on employers hidden in the legislation, and that alone (new overhead that must be accounted for before any profit is realized) inhibits job creation and could easily incentivize further layoffs (and as this monster bloats in cost, waste, fraud, and abuse, watch the price tag go all the way to Pluto).

At least a third of business owners have clearly mentioned Obamacare as either the first or second biggest reason they are not hiring or will not in the near future.

But all this is moot. The central government has no business whatsoever paying of the medical care of its citizens. This is a critically dangerous exercise in turning health, and especially life and death health issues, over to unaccountable bureaucrats and ideologues in a federally controlled and politically motivated system of medical rationing who's entire operation is centered around saving money and in which no market forces or disciplines determine the actual value of medical care (its price) and dynamic innovation, quality of care, and availability of care will decline alarmingly.

The nation is already utterly broke, and has been for sometime. No possible tax increases that did not simply wreck the economy outright could possibly pay for it given the other commitments already made and the well over $26 trillion federal debt we will face in just ten years (especially as its costs begin to spiral out of control, as they inevitably will and have in Britain and Canada).

Social Security and Medicare are also set for inevitable collapse sometime in the late 2020s to early 2030s, and their unfunded liabilites are in the many tens of trillions.

We had better grow up as a people, intellectually, morally, and psychologically, before we have no more civil society to pass on to our children and grandchildren.

Socialism does not work. It cannot work. There is no historical precedent or example of its success.

Anywhere.

But let's do it "for the children" anyway.

[_krose]

“David” (he asked to remain anonymous for obvious reasons)

Yeah, for the "obvious reason" that he's probably making it up and doesn't want anyone verifying his story.

I had to lay off 22 people today to make sure that my business is gonna thrive and I’m gonna be around for years to come. I have to build up that nest egg now for the taxes and regulations that are coming my way.

Okay, so now we are expected to believe that this guy's business will make more money if he gets rid of these 22 employees. If that's the case, why has he kept them employed up to this point? What a terrible businessman. If an employee costs you money rather than making you money, you should not be retaining that employee.

But this narrative does represent the notion seemingly held by the doomsday crowd who whine about the harm of taxing "job creators." They imply that hiring people is essentially an act of charity (rather than a good business decision) that won't happen unless we let rich people keep more money.

[_ajax18]

If he fired these people, is he liable for unemployment benefits? I heard part of taxmageddon will be reducing unemployment benefits as well.

This story seems to fit what has been happening on Wall Street since this election was called.