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True, but they could easily get the same deduction for wages/salaries/pay, same rules apply really and labor costs are probably less gamed in terms of balance s

True, but they could easily get the same deduction for wages/salaries/pay, same rules apply really and labor costs are probably less gamed in terms of balance sheets. Benefits on the job were probably needed at a time but currently they are favoring large caps like you mention. This is ultimately the worst legacy thing that unions left behind eventhough they helped pay go up and brought some good things. Unions should have always been on more pay not benefits. We have got to start leveling the playing field for small/medium business and even self-proprietors. Removing health insurance from employers is key, this will also help being able to change jobs more frequently and not contribute to ageism so much. Insurance companies group people by company usually so small companies are high risk, and individuals even more, the worst way to spread risk. Plus as companies grow more and wages grow less, companies will start to reach a feudal/sharecropper like state where you starting a business is nearly impossible because there is no way to compete. Which then negatively impacts new business creation, small business employment, entrepreneurship rates, geographic mobility, etc. Agreed, this also makes it much easier to start companies in places other than the US that also have a single-payer/individual or private market option and not require the employer to provide it. Employers handling our healthcare and benefits really has added drag to our economy and entrepreneurial/innovative spirit.

prostoalex 9y ago
> Removing health insurance from employers is key, this will also help being able to change jobs more frequently and not contribute to ageism so much. Agree. Unfortunately, there's zero political will to do this. Republicans seem to be hell-bent on destroying Obamacare as a concept, no matter the consequences, and view decreased number of sign-ups and decreased number of insurance sellers, as positive developments and proof that the system "doesn't work". Democrats would surely welcome decoupling of employment and health insurance, right? Except ACA mandates employers with headcount 50+ offer health insurance, which robs the exchanges of a fairly healthy portion of the population that's fit enough to be in the workforce (prior to ACA mandatory health coverage applied to employers with 100+ headcount). Some employers have run the numbers and figured out that if they paid the ACA fines and transferred the employee health coverage to a public exchange, their balance sheet would still be better off. Double win for a federal government - not only there's extra revenue in terms of fines (the money that previously went to a private insurer), the exchange gets bolstered with a significant number of new participants, which dilutes the risk pool and hopefully make everyone's coverage cheaper. Not so fast, said Obama administration, and slapped an extra fine to discourage such behavior https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/us/irs-bars-employers-from-dumping-workers-into-health-exchanges.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/us/irs-bars-employers-fro...

prostoalex 9y ago

> Removing health insurance from employers is key, this will also help being able to change jobs more frequently and not contribute to ageism so much. Agree. Unfortunately, there's zero political will to do this. Republicans seem to be hell-bent on destroying Obamacare as a concept, no matter the consequences, and view decreased number of sign-ups and decreased number of insurance sellers, as positive developments and proof that the system "doesn't work". Democrats would surely welcome decoupling of employment and health insurance, right? Except ACA mandates employers with headcount 50+ offer health insurance, which robs the exchanges of a fairly healthy portion of the population that's fit enough to be in the workforce (prior to ACA mandatory health coverage applied to employers with 100+ headcount). Some employers have run the numbers and figured out that if they paid the ACA fines and transferred the employee health coverage to a public exchange, their balance sheet would still be better off. Double win for a federal government - not only there's extra revenue in terms of fines (the money that previously went to a private insurer), the exchange gets bolstered with a significant number of new participants, which dilutes the risk pool and hopefully make everyone's coverage cheaper. Not so fast, said Obama administration, and slapped an extra fine to discourage such behavior https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/us/irs-bars-employers-from-dumping-workers-into-health-exchanges.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/26/us/irs-bars-employers-fro...