Whether an employer is an Applicable Large Employer and, therefore, subject to the employer shared responsibility provisions, depends on the size of its workforce.  In general, employers employing 50 or more full-time employees, including full-time equivalent employees (a combination of part-time employees that count as one or more full-time employees) are ALEs.

Whether an employer is an ALE in a particular calendar year generally depends on the size of the employer’s workforce in the preceding calendar year. For example, an employer will use information about the size of its workforce during the previous calendar year to determine if it is an ALE for the current calendar year.