The truth about the Health Care Law

GOP House leaders are now claiming the Congressional Budget Office has said the Health Care law will kill around 650,000 jobs. Some people just love to distort numbers. The CBO never said that.

What CBO actually said is the impact of Barack Obama’s health care law on supply and demand for labor would be minuscule. A great deal of it would come from people who no longer need to work, or can switch to less demanding forms of employment, because insurance will be available outside that job.

“The legislation, on net, will reduce the amount of labor used in the economy by a small amount, roughly half a percent primarily by reducing the amount of labor that workers choose to supply.” – CBO

Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio and other top Republicans, chose to twist reality and say the CBO “has determined that the law will reduce the ‘amount of labor used in the economy by roughly half a percent.,’ an estimate that adds up to roughly 650,000 jobs lost.”

So basically Boehner and other GOP leaders deleted the fact that the impact would be small, and added the lie of 650,000 jobs would be lost.

From the Associated Press…

The Republican translation doesn’t track, said economist Paul Fronstin of the nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute. “People voluntarily working less isn’t the same as employers cutting jobs,” he explained.

For example, CBO said some people might decide to retire earlier because it would be easier to get health care, instead of waiting until they become eligible for Medicare at age 65.

The law “reduces the amount of labor supplied, but it’s not reducing the ability of people to find jobs, which is what the job-killing slogan is intended to convey,” said economist Paul Van de Water of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The center advocates for low-income people, and supports the health care law.

In theory, any legislation that increases costs for employers can lead to job loss. But with the health care law, companies can also decide to pass on added costs to their workers, as some have already done this year.

To put things in perspective, there are currently about 131 million jobs in the economy. CBO projects that unemployment will be significantly lower in 2014, when the law’s major coverage expansion starts.

Some Republicans will stoop to any level. But I expect nothing less from a group of people that claim they are concerned about unemployment in America while supporting legislation and regulations which encourage corporations to ship jobs out of the United States. Oh, and if the Democrats try to keep jobs here, they’re socialists. What a joke.

[FACT CHECK: Shaky health care job loss estimate]

Posted: January 18, 2011 at 7:25 pm | by Ryan
Filed under: Politics
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