re: #680 engineer dog

no, they will still pay more in the future for not providing coverage than they do now

there is no penalty or requirement to fulfill if they don’t provide coverage now

Is your assumption that most companies don’t pay for insurance now? The vast majority of jobs include insurance coverage as a benefit.

I can assure you the costs at my company (any company really) are much more than $2000 per employee to provide health insurance. So yes, there are some companies representing a small percentage of the workforce that now pay nothing because they offer no benefits. Point is, almost every company that does offer benefits now will have incentives to drop coverage.

Now, I don’t want to drop coverage on my employees, but if my competitors drop coverage and their employees go into the exchange they will lower their labor costs. I may be forced to drop coverage to stay competitive.