In a new Buzzfeed interview, President Barack Obama criticized the office supply company Staples Inc. for not entirely embracing the spirit of his health care reform, but Staples shot back saying that the president appears to be misinformed.
Under Obama's Affordable Care Act, companies with more than 100 full-time workers are required to either cover their employees' health care or pay fines of $2,000 to $3,000 per employee. The law only applies to employees who work at least 30 hours per week, and some companies are taking various measures to ensure part-time workers don't go over that threshold, according to Reuters.
Staples, the leading office retailer in the U.S., has warned employees that those who work more than 25 hours a week could be fired, and that didn't sit too well with Obama.
"It's one thing when you've got a mom-and-pop store who can't afford to provide paid sick leave or health insurance or minimum wage to workers but when I hear large corporations that make billions of dollars in profits trying to blame our interest in providing health insurance as an excuse for cutting back workers' wages, shame on them," Obama told Buzzfeed in an interview published Wednesday.
Staples CEO Ronald Sargent made $10.8 million in 2013, and the company reported a net profit of $620.1 million since Feb. 1, 2014, reported Reuters.
"There is no reason for an employer who is not currently providing health care to their workers to discourage them from either getting health insurance on the job or being able to avail themselves of the Affordable Care Act," Obama said in the interview. "I haven't looked at Staples stock lately or what the compensation of the CEO is, but I suspect that they could well afford to treat their workers favorably and give them some basic financial security, and if they can't, then they should be willing to allow those workers to get the Affordable Care Act without cutting wages."
Staples responded to the criticism by saying that its part-time policy is actually more than a decade old and has nothing to do with Obama's insurance requirements, reported CNN.
"Unfortunately, the president appears to not have all the facts," Staples spokesman Kirk Saville told CNN, adding that the Buzzfeed report is misleading.
"It's unfortunate that the president is attacking a company that provides more than 85,000 jobs and is a major taxpayer," he added.
As of its most recent filings, Staples had 46,361 full-time workers and 36,647 part-time workers - the same percentage of part-time workers as it had in 2008 before the health care law was passed, CNN noted.
