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Obama Instructs a Private Company on How to Run Its Business
We are living in a new nation.
The more government gets into your business, the more it believes it has a right to meddle in your business. And the government, as the government has amply demonstrated, DOESN’T KNOW WHAT IT’S DOING. And it is doing a lot.
Your freedom is being eroded. I nearly wrote slowly eroded, but it doesn’t seem to be very slow anymore.
In his interview with Buzzfeed, President Obama became passionate at the notion that a private business, Staples, was taking steps to adjust its business in response to the costs imposed upon it by the government.
Now we can’t have that, can we? Fire up the IRS! Let’s write a new regulation. Issue an executive order. Wait, too many those, make it a presidential memorandum.
It seems Staples is trying to keep it’s part-time employees – part-time employees, mind you – from getting above the 30-hour threshold that would require Staples to provide health insurance or pay the Obamacare penalty.
Staples, you’ve been warned!
From the interview:
Obama saved his sharpest words Tuesday for American companies that have not entirely embraced the spirit of the Affordable Care Act, his health care overhaul. Under Obamacare, the federal government, beginning last month, requires that companies with 100 or more full-time workers either cover their employees’ health care or pay penalties of $2,000 to $3,000 per employee. The legislation applies to workers who put in at least 30 hours a week — and some companies are now going to great lengths to make sure their part-time workers do not exceed that threshold.
In particular, the office supply giant Staples, BuzzFeed News reported exclusively Monday, has warned workers who put in more than 25 hours a week that they could be fired.
“There is no reason for an employer who is not currently providing health care to their workers to discourage them from either getting health insurance on the job or being able to avail themselves of the Affordable Care Act,” Obama said. “I haven’t looked at Staples stock lately or what the compensation of the CEO is, but I suspect that they could well afford to treat their workers favorably and give them some basic financial security, and if they can’t, then they should be willing to allow those workers to get the Affordable Care Act without cutting wages.”
“It’s one thing when you’ve got a mom-and-pop store who can’t afford to provide paid sick leave or health insurance or minimum wage to workers … but when I hear large corporations that make billions of dollars in profits trying to blame our interest in providing health insurance as an excuse for cutting back workers’ wages, shame on them,” Obama said.
This is Obama at his most emphatic, weaving together his signature policy achievement and economic fairness.
Buzzfeed helpfully adds that Staples CEO Ronald Sargent brought home $10.8 million in total compensation in the year that ended February 1 and the company reported $707 million in profits.
Let’s instruct Obama about the private sector.
First of all IT’S THE PRIVATE SECTOR. NOT THE PUBLIC SECTOR. But that distinction is of course lost on him.
Here’s a homewok assignment for the president:
Please purchase, as I am certain is not currently among your collection, and I get a percentage through my affiliate relationship with Amazon.
Special attention, please, to Chapter V, “Of Property.” Wherein:
As much land as a man tills, plants, improves, cultivates, and can use the product of, so much is his property. He by his labour does, as it were, inclose it from the common.
Secondly, if Ronald Sargent made $10.8 million last year, then that is what his board of directors thinks he is worth. Few people on this planet have the talent, intelligence, discipline, and vision to lead a large corporation. That is why the market – I’m sorry to use terms with which you are unfamiliar – decides their compensation should be BIG.
And finally, with purchases moving online, Staples is going to close 135 stores this year. Maybe, with his frequent travels, Obama can stop by one of them and escort the former employees out himself.
Source: http://www.whitehousedossier.com/2015/02/12/obama-instructs-private-company-run-business/
