Hobby Lobby has been in the news quite a lot lately. The reason has to do with the court cases that the company has filed in regards to the birth control mandate. Here are the facts of the situation.
* Hobby Lobby is a Christian chain of stores that sell craft supplies. There are 525 Hobby Lobby stores across the nation. The CEO is David Green. According to Forbes, David Green has a net worth of $4.5 billion.
* As of August 1, 2012, all health plans are required to cover women’s preventative health care without charging for a co-pay, coinsurance, or deductible. It includes all forms of contraception that were approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
* An exemption to the birth control mandate was granted to religious employers.
* According to the regulations set forth in the Affordable Care Act, a religious employer is one that: (1) Has the inculcation of religious values as its purpose; (2) primarily employs persons who share its religious tenets; (3) primarily serves persons who share its religious tenets; and (4) is a non-profit organization.
* The Food and Drug Administration has approved of the following forms of contraception: male condom, female condom, diaphragm with spermicide, sponge with spermicide, cervical cap with spermicide, spermicide (alone), oral contraceptives, contraceptive patch, vaginal contraceptive ring, contraceptive injections, Plan B, Plan B One -Step, Next Choice, Ella, copper IUD, IUD with progestin, implantable contraceptive rods, and both female and male sterilization.
* CEO David Green feels that “morning after pills”, “week after pills”, and IUD’s are equivalent to abortion. He feels that offering these forms of contraception would go against his own religious beliefs. He filed a lawsuit in an effort to be allowed to exclude coverage for those forms of birth control in the health plans the Hobby Lobby company offers its workers.
* U.S. District Judge Joe Heaton denied Hobby Lobby’s request in November of 2012. The judge said, (in part):
Hobby Lobby and Mardel are not religious organizations.
* In December of 2012, David Green asked the United States Supreme Court for an emergency injunction against the birth control mandate. The Supreme Court denied the request.
* Hobby Lobby has now stated that it will refuse to offer coverage for the types of contraception that the Green family considers to be against their own, personal, religious beliefs in the health plans offered to employees.
* As of January 1, 2013, employers who choose not to comply with the Affordable Care Act will face an excise tax of $100 per day per individual for each day the employer sponsored health plan does not comply with the requirement. According to CNN, this could mean Hobby Lobby will be paying $1.3 million per day.
Image by Mike Kalasnik on Flickr