The Obama Recession
http://townhall.com/columnists/johncgoodman/2012/11/17/the_obama_recession
Townhall – John C. Goodman – 11/17/2012
Full time work is about to get
scarcer. The reason? By hiring part-time workers who put in less than 30 hours
per week, employers can avoid a mandate dictated by the new health reform law:
either provide expensive health insurance or pay a fine equal to $2,000 per
worker. Avoiding the mandate becomes even more attractive for low-wage
employees, since they can get highly subsidized insurance in the newly created
health insurance exchanges. According to the Wall Street
Journal:
Clearly the Affordable Care Act
(ObamaCare) is a major factor holding back economic recovery. But it’s not
alone. Other public policies enacted during the Obama administration’s first
four years have been affecting the supply side of the
market.
A new book by University of Chicago economist Casey Mulligan estimates that about half the precipitous 2007-2011 decline in the labor-force-participation rate and in hours worked can be blamed on easier eligibility rules for unemployment insurance, food stamps and housing aid.
The annual value in average benefits
for not working rose to $14,000 per recipient in 2011 — the high was $16,000 in
2009 — up from $10,000 in 2007. Such increases were inversely related to changes
in average hours worked. On average, Americans worked a stunning 120 fewer hours
in 2009 than in 2007 — the largest contraction in work effort of any recession
since the Depression. Since 2009, work hours and labor-force participation have
remained at record lows even though the recession officially ended in June
2009.
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