The North Dakota Legislature Gets a Chance to Help Business, Consumers - and One of the State's Most Useful Industries, Says NAPEO.BISMARCK, N.D. -- A committee of the North Dakota North Dakota, state in the N central United States. It is bordered by Minnesota, across the Red River of the North (E), South Dakota (S), Montana (W), and the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba (N). legislature considers Tuesday a bill to regulate professional employer organizations A professional employer organization (PEO) provides outsourcing of payroll, workers' compensation, human resources and employee benefits administration. It does this by hiring a client company’s employees, thus becoming their employer of record. , or PEOs. Small businesses outsource to PEOs their human resources The fancy word for "people." The human resources department within an organization, years ago known as the "personnel department," manages the administrative aspects of the employees. operations, like paying wages, remitting payroll taxes to the government or administering health benefits. The National Association of Professional Employer Organizations, the industry's trade association, supports the bill, which requires PEOs to register with the Secretary of State, file audited financial statements and maintain a minimum amount of working capital. PEOs let small businesses offer big-business benefits like health insurance and a 401(k) while keeping owners from getting tangled in red tape. Instead owners can concentrate on expanding their business. But PEOs can also accrue liabilities quickly - for instance, collecting and paying employees' income taxes - and get into trouble if they're not operated properly. In the rare event a PEO fails, it can leave unpaid wages, taxes, unemployment insurance, workers compensation premiums and health insurance premiums, putting small businesses on the hook Adj. 1. on the hook - caught in a difficult or dangerous situation; "there I was back on the hook" dangerous, unsafe - involving or causing danger or risk; liable to hurt or harm; "a dangerous criminal"; "a dangerous bridge"; "unemployment reached dangerous and their employees in the hole. North Dakota's PEOs have a long tradition of operating honestly and efficiently and of helping small businesses prosper. But the Senate's Industry, Business and Labor Committee, in the first hearing on the bill, can help ensure North Dakota will protect its workers and small businesses. In return the industry gets a stable set of rules and regulations that let PEOs know what they can and cannot do and that will let them thrive and prosper. "This is one of these rare situations where everybody wins," said Scott DiBiasio, the trade association's assistant director of state government affairs. "The state ensures its people and businesses are protected, and a fast-growing and useful business gets a fair shake fair shake n. Informal A fair chance, as at achieving success. ." PEOs can help small employers offer health benefits. Fifty-two-thousand North Dakotans had none last year, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the state Department of Health. That's more than 8 percent of the population - or about the population of Fargo. Most of these people are employed, and far more of them work for small businesses than large ones. PEOs can also alleviate the state's "brain drain brain drain n. The loss of skilled intellectual and technical labor through the movement of such labor to more favorable geographic, economic, or professional environments. " by helping small employers offer more competitive benefits to keep educated young people in North Dakota. |
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