ACA/Businesses paying for individual coverage on Exchange/CALGOLD

Many of the Republicans in Congress are looking to eliminate the Affordable Care Act, or at least weaken it.  They are trying  to do so at the Supreme Court.  The Court has agreed to hear a case revolving around whether the federal government can allow subsidies to individuals when their state has opted not to set up its own Exchange.  Clearly this is not applicable in California, but it is a big issue nationally.
They are also trying to do this in Congress.  A bill will be moving forward in the House to change the definition of full time work from 30 hours to 40 hours.  The President has given the indication that he will veto this.  It appears at this time it will have the votes in the House and can stop a filibuster.  It does not appear, however, to have the votes to override a veto.

The other day I was talking to a small business owner who said he dropped his group health insurance telling employees to go to Covered California and get individual  subsidized coverage.  He indicated he would pay for this and the employee would get coverage on a pretax basis.  I suspect there are a lot of small businesses that have done this.  The problem is that it is illegal according to the IRS.  Not only can employers not pay for this, they can't even talk about it.  You can increase the salary of an employee but cannot require they buy coverage and certainly not with pretax dollars.

If you are looking to see what requirements a city or county has for businesses, take a look at  www.calgold.ca.gov.  It will prompt you to select the city and then ask what type of business you have.  Not all cities are listed but it may be a good resource for you.

The trivia for the day is that it is Elvis Presley 80^th birthday today!

Scott Hauge
President
Small Business California
2311 Taraval Street
San Francisco, CA  94116
shauge@cal-insure.com
415-680-2188