Obamacare

State Senator Joe Hardy (R), who represents Mesquite in the State Legislature, was factually incorrect when he recently told a group of local citizens that The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) was interfering with job creation.
Hardy and other Republicans demagogue PPACA as Obamacare but, in fact, it was legislation passed by a 60 to 39 vote in the U.S. Senate and a 219 to 212 vote in the House of Representatives. If they wish to engage in polarizing propaganda then they should call the expansion of Medicare and Social Security in 1969 as Nixoncare.
According to press reports Hardy told local residents, during a September town hall meeting, that: "small businesses are waiting to hire people because they don’t know what’s happening to healthcare. Other businesses are letting their insurance programs go because they felt health care was being taken over by the federal government.” In fact, non-partisan experts have constantly predicted that the law will have little effect on employment.
Republicans constantly repeat the job reduction claim by pointing to a nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report which they say analysts projected job losses for the U.S. economy. In fact, CBO analysts did not predict a job loss. CBO authors actually said that the economy will use less labor primarily because many people will choose to work less, or retire early, as a result of the new law. What CBO projects is mostly a reduction in the supply of labor, which is not the same as a reduction in the supply of jobs.
CBO said one reason fewer people will choose to work is that many low-income people will have more money in their pockets as a result of the law expanding Medicaid and providing federal subsidies for many who buy insurance privately. "The expansion of Medicaid and the availability of subsidies through the exchanges will effectively increase beneficiaries’ financial resources," CBO said. "Those additional resources will encourage some people to work fewer hours or to withdraw from the labor market."
Another reason that people might work less is that the new law requires insurance companies to cover preexisting conditions, and also limits their ability to charge higher rates for older persons who buy policies for themselves.
Further, small businesses, those with 50 or fewer employees, are likely to benefit under the law. According to the Lewin Group, a subsidiary of United Health Group, small business activities actually could come out ahead since they don’t face the employee mandate and they get a tax credit for their health benefit programs. This gives them an advantage in the marketplace especially if they’re competing against larger firms.
According to the Web site FactCheck.org, the GOP also misrepresents a report by the National Federation of Independent Business, projecting a 1.6 million job loss from the Act. But the NFIB did not study the new law. Its report was based on a hypothetical employer mandate that bears little resemblance to what was actually passed — and it also projects a gain of hundreds of thousands of health care and insurance industry jobs.
FactCheck points out that the GOP report refers to the NFIB’s analysis as "independent," but it’s hardly a neutral source. The federation is currently backing repeal of the new law, and has historically been opposed to any requirement that businesses provide coverage for their workers. NFIB also co-sponsored with the Chamber of Commerce an ad criticizing health care legislation.
House Republicans also claim that the Act is a "budget-busting" piece of legislation. The CBO officially scored the new law as self-financing, projecting that it would actually reduce the deficit over the first 10 years — and beyond. Repealing the new law, as Republicans propose, would increase the deficit. CBO’s latest figures project that repealing the new law will increase the deficit by a total of $230 billion over the next 10 years (through fiscal year 2021). So keeping it in place would help the budget, not bust it.
Michael M. McGreer writes on public policy. His books: No Harm, No Foul, Bioterrorism in the 21st century, and All Rivers Flow West, are both available in the MesquiteCitizen Journal book store. Click here to see his blog