In their zeal to deliver a health care bill by Christmas, Senate Democrats have inserted an 11th-hour jobs-killing provision that unfairly singles out the construction industry and threatens the viability of small homebuilding firms nationwide. The provision stipulates that small construction industry companies with five or more employees must offer health care coverage — the same requirement for big businesses with multimillion-dollar payrolls — or face stiff fines.
Meanwhile, the mandatory health care threshold for companies in all other industries is 50 or more workers.
With the construction industry's current unemployment rate exceeding 18 percent and more than $200 billion in economic activity lost this past year, the impact would be devastating. The majority of homebuilding firms nationwide are small "mom and pop" operations that employ fewer than a dozen workers and are struggling to stay solvent amid the worst housing downturn in decades. If this provision targeting the construction industry is enacted into law, small builders could be forced to close shop, placing the housing industry on life support nationwide.
Caroline Merrill
Utah Valley Home Builders Association
Orem