The Party of Less Work

[Rapunzel]

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/02/obamacare-jobs-party-of-less-work-103184.html

The Party of Less Work

By RICH LOWRY

February 05, 2014

The Democrats once styled themselves the party of workers. Now, they are the party of people who would have been workers, if it hadn’t been for Obamacare.

The Congressional Budget Office released a new analysis of the economic effects of the health care law on Tuesday that estimates that it will reduce the number of workers, in effect, by 2.5 million in 2024.

This unleashed a torrent of arguments from the Democrats implicitly denigrating the value of work. Perhaps not since Southern fire-eaters attacked Northern “wage slavery” in the mid-19th century has a good honest day’s work been talked about so dismissively. It turns out that discouraging work is just another one of the wonders of Obamacare.

The old jobs crisis was people not having jobs; the new jobs crisis is people having to work. The party devoted to combating inequality is now blithely unconcerned about a law discouraging people — especially people down the income scale — from earning more. So much for its championing of economic mobility.

White House press secretary Jay Carney declared the CBO report a validation of the law: “At the beginning of this year, we noted that as part of this new day in health care, Americans would no longer be trapped in a job just to provide coverage for their families and would have the opportunity to pursue their dreams. This CBO report bears that out.”

If only the number of people effectively dissuaded from working were 5 million, or 7.5 million, the health care law would be an even more stunning triumph of sound public policy and true American values.

A few caveats are in order: We aren’t talking about jobs that are eliminated in the usual sense of discouraging employers from hiring, as some Republican talking points suggested. That would be the demand side for labor; this is the supply side. And the 2.5 million number isn’t for jobs per se, but for “full-time equivalent” positions, i.e., the cumulative lost hours of millions of people deciding to work less.

Nonetheless, the number is devastating. Democrats like Jay Carney want to pass it all off as ending the “job lock” that keeps people in a job only to preserve their health insurance. This is what Nancy Pelosi was getting at when she airily described Obamacare before its passage as “an entrepreneurial bill, a bill that says to someone, if you want to be creative and be a musician or whatever, you can leave your work, focus on your talent, your skill, your passion.”

[Chieftain]

yep...it really makes you wonder how any of them can look themselves in the mirror and claim they really believe their own line of BS. 

[massadvj]

This is really at the heart of liberalism.  The poet, no matter how bad his poetry, should be paid for his efforts.  The man who obsessively pounds nail after nail into a board for hours on end should be paid, regardless of whether there is a market for what he produces.  And if these people are deserving of compensation, then why not the fat, pregnant teenager sitting on the couch eating chocolates and watching Dr. Phil?  Whose to say her delusional "dreams" are not as valid as anyone else's?

Ah, utopia.  Ain't it grand?  The janitor who cleans your toilets, the waitress who serves your food, the cook who cooks it, and the hospital orderly who empties colostomy bags?  These are the chumps in their world view.

[Chieftain]

How have we got to the point in this country where hard work, determination, enthusiasm and personal skill are now ridiculed??  At one time those things were a big part of what defined Americanism itself.