Health Care Reform and Part-Time Workers

Health-care overhaul will improve insurance options for part-time workers, By Michelle Andrews, June 29, 2010, Washington Post: “Sarah Rose Nordgren works 25 to 30 hours a week as a waitress at an upscale restaurant in Chapel Hill, N.C. She also tutors high- schoolers on their college entrance essays and has an editorial internship at a book publisher. But if something were to go seriously wrong with her health, she’d be in trouble because none of her three jobs offers health insurance. She’s been looking for a full-time job with benefits for several months, but there’s nothing on the horizon. So she shuttles between jobs and hopes that she stays healthy. Nordgren’s situation is not unusual. Fewer than a third of employers that offer health insurance make it available to their part-time workers, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. (Kaiser Health News is a program of the foundation.) And even if health insurance benefits are offered, part-timers, who often work in lower-paid retail, restaurant and service jobs, may not be able to afford them…”