Farm Contractors Balk At Obamacare Requirements

NPR ^ | February 9, 2016 | by April Dembosky

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Obamacare is putting the agricultural industry in a tizzy.

Contractors who provide farm labor must now offer workers health insurance are complaining loudly about the cost in their already low-margin business.

Last year, employers with 100 or more full-time employees had to offer health insurance to their workers or pay a stiff penalty. This year, employers with 50 to 99 full-time employees must comply.

The cost isn't the only thing about Obamacare stressing people out in the ag industry. Some are worried about immigration problems. Employers have to file new health care forms with the IRS for all their workers, whether or not they accept the insurance.

Attorney Kaya Bromley says this will make it harder for some contractors to turn a blind eye when workers give them fraudulent documents. "I have heard of employees who are choosing to opt out because they want to fly under the radar. I have also heard of employers who are urging the opt-out or at least encouraging it," she says. "And I warn all of them that they are going to be in big trouble."

Golinda Vela Chavez helps run a contracting company in Salinas, Calif. For her, talk of Obamacare mainly brings up frustration with the country's complicated immigration system. She says the U.S. doesn't enforce the borders, but then doesn't let people work. And suddenly the employer is evil," she says.

[IC Ken]

Think of the power the Government will have when NO ONE can afford food.

[iontheball]

Socialism’s insanity knows no bounds on regulating the life out of a society.

[exnavy]

Hows that hope and change working out for you folks?

[LoneStar42]

One trillion candlepower light on illegals, and their managers.

[lafroste]

After a few years of this, I fully expect the feds to show at my door and tell me that I am the only person in the country who is not exempt from Obamacare as all other inhabitants have dealt themselves an out of one kind or another. Then they will present me with my "fair share" bill of approximately 3 trillion dollars with orders to pay up.

Not to worry, I'll just cut them a check.

[DungeonMaster]

Communism ruined the Cuban cigar.

[Buckeye McFrog]

Obamacare serving as a brake against the employment of illegals.

Irony: The Mark of Quality Literature.

[PAR35]

All part of the system to give farmers plausible deniability while having the benefits of using illegals.

Meanwhile, the illegals are treated worse than the slaves were. (Slaves had value, and slaveowners saw to their health, feeding, and housing. Illegals are disposable and sometimes live in deplorable conditions).

[PAR35]

Just endorse your Cruz check over to them.

[glorgau]

Oops, now they’ll have to employ more automation.

[NEMDF]

We are just one democrat CIC away from this, I fear.

[Minutemen]

Obama messing with our food supply.

Brilliant!

Down with this traitor.

[EternalVigilance]

The radical environmentalists, the statist busybodies, the bureaucrats, the socialists, the crony capitalists, the corporatists, the globalists, the out-of-control judiciary, the Congress, the executive branch, state governments, academia, the media, are all colluding to regulate America, and free American enterprise, out of existence. We the People must rein them in, or perish. It’s that simple.

[rstrahan]

So corporate and family farmers will contract out the labor, especially seasonal workers. Any workers will be either day labor or contract, keeping below the 50 full time workers. The contract labor providers will make their workers sign independent contractor forms, so they won’t have to provide the healthcare, stating that the contractor is only providing transportation to and from the site, facilitating an independent contractor to the farmer.

The result is no one gets anything.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Starvation has always been part of the communist toolkit.

[EternalVigilance]

The result is no one gets anything.

That's always the result of state socialism, of course.

[VRWCarea51]

Golinda Vela Chavez helps run a contracting company in Salinas, Calif. For her, talk of Obamacare mainly brings up frustration with the country's complicated immigration system. She says the U.S. doesn't enforce the borders, but then doesn't let people work. And suddenly the employer is evil," she says.

So says the mouth piece of an industry that has rose up PUTTING AMERICANS OUT OF WORK by offering the services of ILLEGALS at half the rate of pay. Now she is going to whine about having to verify paperwork instead of screwing over the American Taxpayers. That dog don't hunt sweet pea. FUGVC

[HotHunt]

I’m surprised some businesses haven’t come up with the idea of starting a completely new company when their employees reach 49 total. The paperwork involved might be more than the penalty or the healthcare costs.