Part-time Employees, Full-time Benefits?

Lately I've been attracting more clients who want to work part-time. Sometimes it's because they need to be home with their kids during the day, sometimes it's because they are interested in a semi-retirement, where they can still enjoy the community of the workplace. Sometimes they are trying to get a business off the ground and need some steady income until that happens. But they all have one thing in common: they want health benefits.

For those of you reading this article outside the US, this won't make a lot of sense. Your health insurance or ability to see a doctor is most likely not tied to your job. But for those of us working over here in the dark ages, read on.

I wanted to find out just how likely it was that we could find part time options with full time benefits- turns out, the prospects are a little better than I thought. Not impressive, by any stretch of the imagination, but it exists. And it's not all at Starbucks and UPS (though those are still available options). The question is, will the work all be customer service oriented? Is there room to grow? Could the job be... meaningful?

When you work part-time, you already have work-life balance built in. You have time to do things that make life meaningful, like develop friendships, a business you care about, or take care of family. Perhaps your job won't be your main source of purpose. But there were a few “career jobs” I saw posted with full benefits at 20 hours or more where you would not be serving coffee. Still, most of what I found were lower-salary jobs.

The question to ask yourself is, what do I want out of work? If all you need is health benefits, perhaps it won't matter if your salary is lower. But if you need a high salary, part-time work, and benefits your search will be considerably tougher. If you can work a full 32 hours your options will improve dramatically.

Something interesting I found was that the companies who were generous with part-time benefits didn't stop at health insurance. I saw adoption assistance, tuition reimbursement, and will writing services a few times too.

Here are some of your part-time jobs with benefits options- by no means is this exhaustive: Whole Foods, Allegis Group, Costco, Lowe's, Nike, Land's End, Vohra Wound Physicians, Kaplan, Starbucks, Caribou, Chipotle, Macy's, UPS, Wegmans, Uhaul, JPMorgan Chase, REI, Shire

​Notable Minnesota options for my local subscribers: Fairview, Pillsbury United Communities, HealthEast

Do you work somewhere with full benefits for part-timers? I want to hear about it!

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