By 2015, any company with more than 50 such employees (including "full-time equivalent employees," according to the law) will have to offer health benefits. If their businesses are profitable, they could dig into margins to cover the cost of insuring additional workers, thus curbing growth; or the owners could simply cut workers' hours to stay away from the 30-hour threshold as much as possible. About 16 percent of restaurant workers are at risk of reduced hours, according to estimates from UC Berkeley's Center for Labor Research and Education. Firehouse Subs, the fastest-growing restaurant chain in the U.S. with more than 660 company-owned and franchised restaurants, doesn't plan to cut workers' hours. Restaurant chains and franchisees argue that the mandate disproportionately affects their industry, where profit margins typically range from 3 to 5 percent. Hawaii for decades has required employers to offer health insurance to employees who work more than 20 hours per week, and San Francisco businesses with 20 or more employees must spend a minimum amount on health care based on the number of employees and hours worked under a 2008 law. (Some restaurants started adding a surcharge to bills to cover the cost.) Of course, some major restaurant chains, such as Starbucks and the Cheesecake Factory, already offer insurance to employees who work fewer than 30 hours a week. [...] not all of the newly eligible workers will decide to buy the insurance. Steve Caldeira, CEO of the International Franchise Association, said this will "create costly and burdensome tracking of employees' hours" for businesses and keep employees from having "the flexibility to work the hours they need and are accustomed to."
Reported by SFGate 1 hour ago.
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