The founder of Domino’s Pizza, Tom Monaghan, is suing the federal government over the portion of the Affordable Care Act that requires companies to include coverage for birth control in employer sponsored health insurance plans. A YouGov Brand Index poll notes that consumer’s perception drops when business owners complain about health insurance coverage requirements for workers.
Here’s the basic facts of the situation. On August 1, 2011, the Department of Health and Human Services added several women’s preventative services into the previously described list of preventative care. All health plans purchased after that date must include preventative care to consumers without charging for a co-pay, co-insurance, or a deductible.
Birth control was included as preventative care. A controversy followed. A compromise was made. Churches, synagogues, mosques, and other places of worship were allowed to offer employer sponsored health plans that did not cover birth control. Businesses, hospitals, and universities, were not.
Recently, the founder of Domino’s Pizza, Tom Monaghan, sued the federal government over the birth control mandate. According to the Christian Science Monitor, Tom Monaghan is a devout Roman Catholic. The Christian Science Monitor reports that he has stated that he feels that contraception isn’t health care but a “gravely immoral” practice.
Tom Monaghan feels that the law requiring employers to include birth control in employer sponsored health plans violates his rights. He also isn’t happy about being faced with a fine if he chooses not to comply with the health reform law.
According to the Christian Science Monitor the lawsuit was filed by Tom Monaghan, and it also lists as a plaintiff Domino’s Farms, which is an office park complex in Michigan that Tom Monaghan owns. The pizza franchise is not listed in the lawsuit. I suspect that many consumers will not be aware of the difference.
Perhaps Tom Monaghan is unaware of a poll done by YouGov Brand Index that shows that consumer perception of a franchise drops when the owners use “Anti-Obamacare rhetoric” (as YouGov Brand Index phrases it).
Respondents were asked: “If you’ve heard anything about the brand in the last two weeks, through advertising, news or word of mouth, was it positive or negative?” Respondents were specifically asked about Papa John’s, Applebee’s and Denny’s. All three businesses had their scores drop after consumers heard their owners talking about dropping workers health insurance coverage, or cutting hours or jobs to avoid offering their workers health care.
This same effect happened to Darden Restaurants (which includes Olive Garden and Red Lobster) after their owner created a pilot program. The program was designed to cut workers hours in order to avoid having to offer health insurance to their workers (and also to avoid having to pay a fine for choosing not to do so).
The pilot program has ended. In a news release, Darden said (in part):
Our outlook for the year also reflects the potential impact, though difficult to measure, of recent negative media coverage that focused on Darden within the full-service segment and how we might accommodate healthcare reform.
When consumer’s perceptions of a business drops, the consumers stop spending money there. This affects that profits of the business.
Image by Steve Tolcher on Flickr