Disney Says Yes to ObamaCare

[TravisBicklesMohawk]

I know some companies are doing just the opposite, like Home Depot, but this is a great start and I hope more billion dollar companies will learn from Disney and follow.

October 03, 2013 09:00 AM
Disney World Promotes Part Time Workers to Full Time For Obamacare Benefits
By John Amato

Here's some nice news for a change. If you watch the news you'd only think that companies are cutting workers hours to avoid covering their health insurance, but that's not so. Disney World is doing the right thing and then some for its employees:

Walt Disney Co. announced on Wednesday that it is offering full-time employment to the 427 part-time employees at its Disney World theme park in Orlando, Florida who work at least 30 hours per week — the threshold at which the Affordable Care Act requires large employers with 50 or more workers to offer basic health benefits to employees or risk paying a $2,000 per employee fine after the first 30 workers.

Disney already offers a level of health coverage that is acceptable under Obamacare to its full-time employees. But part-time workers, including those who work at the 30-hour cutoff set by the health law, receive more limited benefits. Instead of rolling back these workers’ hours to avoid expanding their health coverage, Disney is choosing to promote them to full-time status.

“Disney wants to be proactive,” said Ed Chambers, president of the Service Trades Council union that represents tens of thousands of Orlando Disney employees, in an interview with Bloomberg News. “Disney is way out in front on this.”

That’s a striking departure from some retail and service sector firms that have used Obamacare’s employee coverage requirement as an excuse to cut hours and benefits. While the vast majority of firms are not engaging in such tactics, high-profile stories about companies that do adopt that approach tend to dominate media coverage.

In fact, Disney’s decision tracks with a recent survey of chief financial officers at large American firms finding that American companies actually intend to increase their number of full-time employees by almost 2 percent over the next year, despite repeated claims by Obamacare critics that the reform law will create a part-time economy, discourage hiring, or encourage employers to roll back workers’ hours to avoid Obamacare.

Do you think Fox News will report this to 'the folks?'

[Sheep_Mafia]

Dummy, stay off those hack sites. That's great and I'm sure all the thousands upon thousands of part-time employees are happy for those 427 who were already working full-time. Here's the real story and it's not quite as feel good as that nonsense you fell for.

"Walt Disney World has offered to elevate 427 part-time workers to full-time status because those employees have worked enough hours during the past year to qualify as full-timers under the federal Affordable Care Act.

But officials with the Service Trades Council, the coalition of unions that represents more than 30,000 full-time and part-time workers at Disney World, say they are hesitant to accept the offer because it could mean elevating some employees over more-senior part-timers who have been waiting for full-time positions.

The 427 part-time workers whom Disney would make full-time represent a tiny sliver of the giant resort's total part-time workforce. Disney has approximately 24,000 part-time employees.


Disney declined to discuss the offer, which was first reported by Bloomberg News.

Disney part-timers generally work no more than 25 hours a week, but they can pick up extra shifts. So some have been able to work more than 1,500 hours during the past year — the approximate threshold used to define full-time employment under the Affordable Care Act, the sweeping health-care-reform legislation championed by President Barack Obama.

The legislation, commonly referred to as "Obamacare," will require large employers to offer comprehensive health insurance to all full-time workers or pay penalties, beginning next year.

Conferring full-time status on the Disney workers would ensure them more hours — generally a minimum of 32 hours a week — as well as giving them access to stronger company-sponsored benefits.

The complication, union leaders say, is that there are other part-time workers who have been with Disney for longer who have been waiting for full-time positions to open up. But those workers may not necessarily have worked as many hours in the past year for a variety of reasons, including the fact that many part-time Disney workers have second jobs with other employers.

"The dilemma is, sure, we want more full-time jobs. But at what cost?" said Joe Condo, a representative of the Transportation Communication Union, which represents Disney monorail pilots, lifeguards and hotel front-desk workers, among other job classifications. "Why don't you just put 400 more people in full-time jobs? But they don't want to do that."

Ed Chambers, president of the Service Trades Council, said Disney management has characterized their offer as a "one-time deal" for the specific employees who worked more than 1,500 hours.

"We've requested more information from Disney, including how many people are getting jumped over," Chambers said.

Other large employers in Orlando's tourism industry, which leans heavily on low-wage, low-benefit part-time labor, are also adjusting their work terms. SeaWorld Entertainment Inc. recently decided to cut hours for its part-time workers from a maximum of 32 a week to 28 a week. The Affordable Care Act defines full-time employees as those who work an average of at least 30 hours a week.

But SeaWorld also says it intends to hire an undisclosed number of full-time workers next year as well.

Worker hours aren't the only issue Disney is grappling with because of health-care reform. The resort currently offers its part-time workers only an extremely limited health-insurance plan that will become illegal next year under Obamacare.

Disney hasn't yet said whether it will offer part-time workers an insurance plan that complies with the federal law. But union officials say they expect the resort to simply stop offering health insurance to part-timers, matching moves made by Universal Orlando and SeaWorld."
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business ... 2084.story

[TravisBicklesMohawk]

Orlando Sentinel? You need to stay of the hack websites.