Believe it or not, as a group insurer, employers’ costs to cover their employees is far less expensive then for an individual who is self employed and seeks such insurance. It is also fair in regard to employees who contribute to their employers’ health care plan. As a result, both employer and employee pay less for, in most cases, very good insurance coverage.
Then too, the employer knows that their injured and valued employees are well taken care of so that they can return to work sooner and without the pressure of paying for large medical bills.
Added incentives such as employer health care insurance gives the employee a feeling of being wanted and also the knowledge that their employer truly cares about them in regard to being a valued worker. Thus, the worker takes a greater interest in the quality of work that person does for the good of the employers’ business and the resulting pride the worker has for the work being completed.
You see, every worker want to feel like they are wanted and respected by their employer. Added incentives such as health care insurance, pensions and profit sharing plans also provides to the employer worker loyalty and better made finished products.
On the other hand, part time employees, as a group, do receive less pay, work less hours and receive less employer benefits. In other words, part time employees are usually hired by employers who have no desire to pay the minimum wage or pay for health care insurance coverage for the good of their part time employees. Some of those kind of employers don’t even contribute to the State unemployment compensation fund in the States where they do business. As such, when they lay-off a part time employee, that employee isn’t even elegible to collect unemployment compensation. So what elso is new?
In an economy where jobs are few and far between, from an employees’ point of view, that stinks! It’s a sign of the complete lack of concern for the working person and it is clear to me that the laws put in place to guarantee workers’ rights need to be revised to cover all kinds of employees, regardless how many employees that a particular employer might employ at a given time. As a matter of fact, each and every employer should be required to obtain a group health insurance plan for the purpose of covering each and every employee who works for them.
Clearly, an increase in the minimum wage isn’t enough to help most, if not all part time workers or those people who just work for the tips provided by restaurant customers or hotel or motel guests. Is your empolyer kind to you? Then again, being kind also means providing health insurance coverage and makeing those payments to the State’s unemployment fund, in behalf of those workers who might someday need that state unemployment assistance.