Employers should not be involved in the health care game at all. It should be a universal right provided by the government as it is in many other countries. This would lead to a healthier population as a whole. It would also lead to a reduction in costs associated with poor people who put off going to the doctor due to inability to cover even co-pay ending up in the emergency room and defaulting on a ~50k bill. In addition government could negotiate for vastly cheaper medications as they would essentially be the only game in town.

This would also allow industry to focus on what industry does which is make money. They no longer would have to spend on expensive Cadillac health care plans in order to compete for employees. Governments job is to keep its populace safe and healthy, that is not the job of private industry.

The only reason we don't have this is due to lobbyists.

My only question is why do employers have to be responsible for healthcare?

Retirement makes sense as this is your source of income. I feel that company resources would be better spent elsewhere than on healthcare.

This would, of course, require universal healthcare or direct market healthcare. This would help new businesses thrive, especially the "mom and pop" types.

I guess I am jaded on this as my parents lost their business when I was growing up due mainly to the cost of healthcare. Not all companies have monolithic budgets.

Well, they could, but. Benefits, particularly health care, are very expensive for employers as well as employees, so employers, especially for lower wage work, look for ways to cut that. Not-quite-full-time is one way that's done.

Getting health insurance, whether public or private, out of the hands of employers is probably the single best thing that could be done for working conditions in America.

My understanding of the current law is benefits are mandatory for employees working more than 32 hours a week. I don't know what the rules are for exempt employees.