雇用主への命令 － オバマケア
オバマケアのなかに「個人への命令」(individual mandate)と並んで「雇用主への命令」(employer mandate)というのがある。これは正社員が５０人以上の企業では、従業員全員に連邦政府認定の保険に加入させる義務があるというもので、それに違反すると、ペナルティ（税）が課せ
られるというものである。
当然、境界線の企業の場合、正規雇用を減らし、非正規を増やすことで５０人より下に押えようというインセンティブが働くことになる。
もし、一人でも連邦政府による助成金を得て保険市場(exchanges.これもオバマケアにより創設が予定されているもの)で保険に加入した従業員がいる場合、雇用主は罰金を課せられることになる。
この雇用主への命令だが、最近、実施が一年延期されることになった。2014年１月であったのが、１年延びたのである。批判者は、オバマ政権は中間選挙に大きな影響を及ぼしかねないこの命令を延ばし、中間選挙後に実施する方針に出た、とみている。
大きな問題は、やはりメディケイドの拡張がスムーズに行かなくなっている点にあると思われる。これは昨年の最高裁判決のなかに、メディケイドの拡張は州政府にゆだねられたからである。当初は全額、連邦政府が費用を負担することになっているのだが、オバマケアは当初から廃案にすることを重要な党の戦略に据えてきた保守党が支配する州（半分はある）では、拡張自体に反対することを決めているのである。そうなると未保険者の貧困層は保険を買うことが不可能になる。批判者はそれを見越して、雇用者命令と個人命令を雇用創出機会の損失、コストの増大、成長の阻害としてオバマケアへの批判の声を高めているのが現状である。
（未保険者は、貧困層である。であるから、保険に入っていない。そしてアメリカの保険料は異常に高いことで有名である。病気にかかっても医療の受信ができないわけである。こうした人がアメリカには４０００万にも存在するのである。批判者はその現実には目をつむっている。）
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The Employer Mandate
“Free-Rider” Provision
ObamaCare does not impose a straight-forward requirement that employers offer health insurance to workers. Proponents of the new law wanted to avoid the charge that the new law was directly imposing new costs on American business. So, instead, they created a back-door mandate, what they call the “free-rider” provision.
If a firm with at least 50 workers has a full-time employee who is getting federally-subsided insurance through an ”exchange,” then that employer must pay a penalty for failing to offer that worker acceptable insurance on the job. (Workers that are offered qualified coverage by an employer are ineligible for the new insurance subsidies provided in the exchanges.)
The tax is scheduled to begin in 2014 and the Congressional Budget Office estimates it will bring in approximately $10 billion in annual revenue once it’s fully implemented.
Penalties For Failure To Insure
For firms which do not offer insurance any insurance, have more than 50 employees, and have at least one employee receiving insurance subsidies, they must pay a tax of $2000 per subsidized employee. The tax is applied to all of a firm’s employees (after excluding the first 30), not just those that are subsidized. For example a firm with 51 employees would pay $42,000 in new annual taxes, and an additional $2,000 tax for every new hire.
For firms that do offer insurance, the penalty is the lesser of $2,000 for every employee (after exempting the first 30) or $3,000) for every employee receiving a subsidy.
The National Federation of Independent Business has a clear and informative table which examines the taxes assessed under different scenarios here.
Disincentives to Hire
ObamaCare’s employer mandate will discourage business development and growth. Small firms with 50 or fewer workers will have very strong disincentives to expand. These businesses can avoid the new penalties by staying small; growth will simply add new costs and burdens. Many businesses with low profit margins are unable to pay the substantial cost of providing comprehensive insurance to all of their employees or the new taxes under ObamaCare’s employer mandate. Once companies reach 50 employees, they are likely to turn to contractors and outsource work to evade the new mandate, even if such arrangements are less efficient than directly hiring new workers.
Part-Time and Seasonal Employees
Fines to employers under the employer mandate also are imposed on workers who are not full-time employees, where a combination of employees working 120 hours per month (around 30 hours per week) count as one employee. This provision in the bill especially hurts seasonal businesses, where it is frequently not cost effective to provide insurance benefits to an employee who will only be with the firm for a short period of time.
Penalizing Low Income Households
ObamaCare provides strong incentives for firms to avoid hiring workers from low-income households. Eligibility for subsidized insurance in the exchanges is based on household income, and firms can be penalized if one of their workers gets subsidized coverage in an exchange. Thus, firms have a strong incentive to find workers who won’t qualify for subsidized coverage, which may also lead to invasions of privacy. For instance, a restaurant might find it better to hire young waiters from upper-income neighborhoods, as opposed to low-income areas, because they would be less likely to qualify for subsidized insurance in the exchanges. ObamaCare therefore is penalizing the very households it was supposedly passed to help.
