Beginning this summer, part-time Hillsdale student workers were not able to work 40 hours a week on campus because the Affordable Care Act restricts seasonal hours.
Before this legislation, some students worked 40-hour weeks over the summer and were limited to 20 hours a week during the semester. Also, the ACA cost Hillsdale $167,000 more in 2013 than in 2012 in just taxes and fees.
“It’s a very intrusive piece of legislation,” Chief Administrative Officer Rich Péwé said.
The legislation expanded the definition of a full-time worker to anyone who works an average of 30 hours a week in a calendar year.
There is a possibility that when a student works 20 hours during the school year and 40 over the summer, the average for the calendar year may exceed the 30 hour-a-week threshold. At that point, the college is required by the ACA to offer those students health insurance.
As a result, the college now caps student workers at 27 hours a week, even during the summer, said Janet Marsh, executive director of human resources.
“The consequence of this law has been to increase the financial hardship of part-time laborers because their overall pay has been reduced,” Provost David Whalen said. “They cannot work as many hours as before.”
This regulation also affects adjunct professors, Marsh said. Before, the college could agree to pay a professor a certain sum for certain performance, but now it has to limit the professor’s hours to 27 a week. Even if a professor thinks he needs 40 hours a week to do his job well, the college can’t allow that, Marsh said.
“The way teaching traditionally operates does not fit the hour-by-hour calculation the ACA uses as its measure. Instructors may teach for this or that many hours, but the time needed to prepare, grade, and consult with students is not the same for all nor can it be absolutely predicted or controlled,” Whalen said. “The absurdities, you see, begin to pile up pretty quickly.”
Marsh said she has to believe it was one of the unintended consequences of the legislation.
Matthew Spalding, vice-president and dean for the Kirby Center, said that since the regulations are continually changing, it is causing complications with hiring interns in Washington, D.C.
“This is just a particular example of the whole dilemma of big, comprehensive legislation,” Spalding said. “It gets very complicated very quickly.”
He said students should not be concerned that the ACA will damage or undermine the Hillsdale internship program, however.
Marsh said that the ACA isn’t all bad. She praised the statute that permits children up to 26 to remain on their parents’ plans and said the mandated wellness benefits helped people stay healthy.
“We are obligated to pay for child check-ups, adult check-ups, immunizations — up front and 100 percent,” Marsh said.
But she said she was less enthusiastic about the increased administrative work. She said she now spends 20 percent of her time doing compliance work.
“It’s a nightmare,” Marsh said. “You go into HR because you like people.”
She said the ACA keeps her in her office instead of interacting with the people at the college.
The ACA also caused complications with the staff’s health reimbursement and health savings accounts, Péwé said. The college has about 400 full-time employees eligible for health insurance.
Additionally, the ACA requires large employers to provide insurance that covers birth control and abortions, Marsh said. Because the college is not a religious institution, it is not exempt.
“The government wanted to shift the cost for those from the government to the employers,” Marsh said.
She encouraged Hillsdale students to graduate, get elected, and vote out the ACA.
