Republicans are all a-twitter over “Appendix B” of the Congressional Budget Office’s annual budget and economic outlook. They aren’t cheered by the overall picture so much as they are by the CBO’s revised figures on the effect Obamacare might have on the economy. The Wall Street Journal notes the ACA will reduce employment:
The rolling impact of the health law will lead to two million fewer workers in 2017, 2.3 million in 2021 and 2.5 million through 2024, the CBO forecast. This represents a 1.5% to 2% reduction in the numbers of hours worked.
And then there are the incentives the law creates:
The agency attributed the law’s projected labor-force impact to several factors. It forecast that some people won’t work or will work less to keep their incomes low enough to ensure their federal health-insurance subsidies aren’t phased out. Other, higher-income workers whose tax rates were increased to help pay for the law may choose to work less, the CBO said.
In addition, because the ACA, starting in 2015, will impose a penalty on companies that employ 50 or more full-time workers but don’t offer insurance, the CBO figures that employers’ demand for workers could decrease and could result in cuts to wages as costs are passed on to employees.
The operative words throughout are “could” and “may.” Remember, these are projections, not facts (though none dare call them “wild guesses”) and no amount of partisan shouting will make them come true.
But as a political weapon, these numbers are powerful stuff that can be, and in Virginia’s case already have been, made into clubs for use against Democratic incumbents:
And to get a sense of just how big a club these CBO numbers are, consider the spin coming out of the White House presser today:
WH's Furman acknowledges people might choose to work less to keep subsidies. Emphasizes it would be their choice.
— Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) February 4, 2014
Yes folks, Obamacare is all about choice. Or something.
Mark Warner will have a wonderful time trying to rationalize all this in the months ahead.
