The Affordable Care Act is one of the most followed in decades. The ruling will impact millions of Americans’ access to health insurance—me being one of them! The court could invalidate or uphold the whole act or strike down provisions within the act.
Here are the 6 possible SCOTUS “Obamacare” outcomes:
Under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act the Medicare tax rate will increase to 2.35% from 1.45% (employee withholding only) on wages paid over $200,000. This will become effective with the 2013 taxable year. The IRS has posted questions and answers on their website to help employers.
http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=258201,00.html
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently approved a final draft that clarifies the Age Discrimination in Employment Act’s (ADEA) “reasonable factors other than age” test. This new standard will make it easier for workers to establish disparate impact claims and will put the burden on employers in defending such claims.
http://www.ogletreedeakins.com/publications/2011-12-16/eeoc-approves-new-age-bias-regulation
In December 2010, the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 reduced the employee social security tax rate to 4.2% for 2011 and left the employer tax rate at 6.2%.
Employees will continue to pay 4.2% in social security tax during the first two months of 2012. This means that employees will pay 4.2% on wages paid in January and February 2012 up to the $110,100 wage base.
The late enactment is making it difficult for many employers to correctly calculate social security tax withholding for the first payrolls of 2012. Therefore, the IRS is asking employers to update their payroll systems as soon as possible, but not later than January 31, 2012. For any social security tax over withheld during January because of the rate change, employers should make an adjustment in employees’ pay as soon as possible, but not later than March 31, 2012. Please review [IR-2011-124, 12-23-11; www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=251650,00.html].
I’m curious if your company has done away with the yearly distress calls from employees and the cost of paper W-2′s?
In today’s short staffed payroll departments it makes sense to eliminate the headaches and expenses of paper W-2′s.
Printing and distribution costs decrease drastically while ease of access for employees takes the burden off of payroll staff due to reprints.
Empowering your employees to use this simple process to access their W-2 faster anytime or anywhere.
