Under the employer mandate of the Affordable Care Act, companies with 50 or more employees are required to offer company-sponsored health insurance come 2015. And while it’s advantageous to employees, the benefit has many employers scratching their heads as to how to fund the coverage.

Putting a face to the issue is Jim Tracy, COO of Park West Cos. in Rancho Santa Margarita, Cal.

Confronted with paying $2.5 million per year to insure employees, Tracy is considering eliminating coverage for spouses and lowering premiums through raising co-payments and deductibles to counter expense.  But that will only return $200,000, he told The Orange County Register.

“I’m going to have no choice but to pass those costs along to my customers,” he said. “I’m going to have to increase my contract costs in some cases by as much as 10 percent to offset the cost of insurance.”

For more on this story and how other companies are strategizing, visit HispanicBusiness.

Additionally, see “Affordable Care?” on how the Affordable Care Act may affect the landscape industry.