Many businesses that don’t offer health insurance to all their employees breathed a sigh of relief earlier this month when they learned they’d have an extra year to comply with the new health care law or face stiff penalties.
President Obama delayed the requirement for businesses with 50 or more employees after complaints that the plan was too complicated to implement by the original deadline, January 2014. Now, the restaurant industry, which employs a lot of part-time employees, is weighing strategies for how to respond.
At a California Tortilla restaurant in downtown Washington, D.C., managers say they’re still figuring out what strategy to use to comply with the new law’s mandate to provide health insurance for all workers who put in at least 30 hours a week: whether they should trim hours, hire more part-timers or leave things unchanged.
