Free Republic

In an experiment apparently aimed at keeping down the cost of health-care reform, Orlando-based Darden Restaurants has stopped offering full-time schedules to many hourly workers in at least a few Olive Gardens, Red Lobsters and LongHorn Steakhouses. Darden said the test is taking place in "a select number" of restaurants in four markets, including Central Florida, but would not give details. The company said there has been no decision made about expanding it. In an emailed statement, Darden said staffing changes are "just one of the many things we are evaluating to help us address the cost implications health care...

Under ObamaCare, companies of more than 50 workers who do not provide health-insurance coverage have to pay significant fines, although not nearly as costly as the insurance itself. That alone might have employers bailing out of the health-insurance market, but the Orlando Sentinel reports that at least one company is testing a way to avoid both costs. Employers do not have to provide health-insurance coverage to part-time workers under ObamaCare as long as they work less than 30 hours a week, and one restaurant company has begun experimenting with changing over entire staffs to part-time work to avoid the ObamaCare...

Don't be surprised that ObamaCare drives unemployment up. CNBC interviewed a restaurateur who fears the combination of workers comp, ObamaCare and sick time could bury her chain of restaurants she's sent the last 25 years building. Madelyn Alfano has a chain or restaurants in the LA area and is President of the LA Chapter of the California Restaurant Association. She' especially worried about her part time employees who have second job. "If we were to pay for the 400 employees, because the bill talks about part-timers--but for each two part-timers that makes that makes one full-timer--from what I gather, it...

Part-Time Workers Mask Unemployment Woes DAVID LEONHARDT July 14, 2009 In California and a handful of other states, one out of every five people who would like to be working full time is not now doing so. Chris Keane. After Richard Smith, 58, was laid off from jobs at two carmakers, he moved to Charlotte, N.C., and found only part-time work. He makes $9.50 an hour repairing clubs at a Golf Galaxy store. It is a startling sign of the pain that the Great Recession is inflicting, and it is largely missed by the official, oft-repeated statistics on unemployment. The...