Darden Restaurants tests limiting worker hours as health-care changes loom

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…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 reform will have on our business. There are still many unanswered questions regarding the health care regulations and we simply do not have enough information to make any decisions at this time.”

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Posted in * Culture-Watch, * Economics, Politics, --The 2009 American Health Care Reform Debate, Consumer/consumer spending, Corporations/Corporate Life, Economy, Health & Medicine, Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market, Personal Finance

10 comments on “Darden Restaurants tests limiting worker hours as health-care changes loom

  1. Phil says:

    Heckuva job, Barry!

  2. Undergroundpewster says:

    The Govt. “fix” will come… I can see it now, less than 30 hours, employers will then pay a pro rata share…

  3. upnorfjoel says:

    I hope that is is on Paul Ryan’s list of talking points cued up for his debate this week.

  4. drummie says:

    We have people losing their jobs and homes and a President that wants to talk about Big Bird. I hope those Chicago thugs keep running this add until the election. Maybe then people will see how lame Obama is and has been. When a restaurant chain this large starts trying to cut back because of Obama care, then you know that it can not bee good for the country. It will cost more jobs, more homes and more misery while Obama fiddles and talks to George Clooney.

  5. Mike L says:

    “Darden has been aggressively keeping labor costs down. It has cut bartenders’ pay and required servers to share tips with them. It also has eliminated busboy positions at Red Lobster and reduced the number of servers working each shift at that chain. Labor costs as a percentage of sales have dropped steadily from 33.1 percent in fiscal 2010 to 30.8 percent in the most recent quarter.”

    The latest excuse for what they’ve already been doing….but that would require reading to the end of the article.

  6. upnorfjoel says:

    I read the entire article #5. So what? This is certainly not the only company that will use this “excuse”. Many already have, unless they’ve received one of those coveted “waivers” Obama’s handing out.
    The point is that this president has given all of these companies one big fat excuse, hasn’t he?

  7. Sarah says:

    RE: “The latest excuse for what they’ve already been doing…”

    Yes — [b]how dare companies attempt to cut costs[/b] as all the other expenses forced on them by the State’s central planning authorities continue to rise and rise and rise and rise.

    Draconian regulations. Dodd Frank. Obamacare. ADA. Taxes. Fuel. Unfunded mandates out the wazoo. Massive HR regulations — ever growing and expanding. Rising utility costs. Rising food costs.

    But for the State those bloated costs wouldn’t exist.

    Utterly insane.

    [i]Inevitably they have their effect on how many people are hired and how much they are paid.[/i]

    Honestly. It’s like somebody’s never even paid bills before.

    Thank God for the Red Lobsters and McDonalds and Dominos and Red Bowls of this world, for grinding away while the State loads them up with heavier and heavier chains and weights, and then others berate them for actually trying to cut costs wherever they can.

    What’s going to just be amazing is standing back and watching all the Central Planners decry the perfectly predictable actions that will be taken to counter the increased costs that their central planning larded on to businesses.

    It’s like watching Episcopal Church apparatchiks flounder around trying to figure out “church growth” and wondering why their parishes are plummeting and diocesan camps have to be sold.

    [i]Consequences.[/i]

  8. Yebonoma says:

    Supposedly this behavior is exactly what the Obamanistas want because it will push the country ever closer to a single payer health care system where that single payer will be your Uncle Sugar.

    As an aside, I saw a table of data from Stephen Moore’s new book on taxes, “Who’s the Fairest of Them All.” (see http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/ir_22.htm for data) It shows that the top 10% in the U.S. pay a greater share of income taxes than in any of the socialist countries of Europe. I’d like to have Barry and his crew explain that one since they always want to emulate Europe. As the Beatles said “there’s one for you, nineteen for me.”

  9. dwstroudmd+ says:

    Now, Sarah, there is an upside you failed to mention. By cutting hours and avoiding insurance payments, there will be an increase in the total number of jobs, so unemployment will go down.

  10. Paul PA says:

    Tha’s known as an intended consequence – the lower unemployment rate