The Supreme Court has finally ruled on Obama care. In the good news category, they ruled that congress can not use the commerce cause to force you to buy insurance or any other products. The bad news is the Individual Mandate still stands as a tax. In 2009, President Obama emphatically declared that the penalty for not buying insurance was NOT a tax, thus proving once again he and his cohorts are lying sacks of crap. (In other news, the sky is blue, the sun rises in the east and water is wet.)
Another section of the ruling says that the feds can not force states to expand medicaide. It was the goal of the federal government to force states to expand those programs by installing penalties taking away existing federal funding for failing to comply. This is not allowed according to the Supremes.
As the talking heads and legal eagles pour over the full text of the ruling, the most important thing is how it effects individual business owners. What exactly is the impact? Well that's where things get tricky. Nobody really knows and that is a serious problem. The sluggish economy will now come to a complete standstill as small business owners try and figure out how this will effect their payrolls.
Personally, I do know that despite wanting to hire someone for my small business, I wont. Not until I can calculate what this will cost me down to the penny. Without that knowledge, hiring could cause serious financial hardship to my family. If I am not hiring despite needing an extra hand, you can be assured that other business owners will be in the same situation. If the legal and political climate effecting your day to day operations is murky, the smartest decision is to make due with what you have and wait for clarity. This means economic paralysis. If you were hoping for a new job or a better paying job anytime soon, your odds just got much much worse.
