On the advice of Pod Camp, I will say nothing of my absence on this blog. I will say tax season is in full swing, but I am still commenting furiously on the PG, when I see something comment worthy. And today I decided to go "old school", and revive my blog posts of my PG comments on Jack Kelly columns. So....
So without further ado .... Today Jack Kelly thinks he has trapped Democrats in their support of job loss caused by "Obamacare", as detailed by the CBO; "Spinning the CBO: The latest analysis further discredits Obamacare". I immediately found a couple of economists who disagree.
This would be exciting if it were any kind of new and significant find. However it is an issue that economists have already acknowledged, but say will not bring about the apocalypse. In general, they say, the positive effects of the ACA (increasing access to healthcare for the poor, allowing some with multiple jobs to drop one job because they would have independent access to health care) outweighs the negative effects of not taking on additional income because of drops in *all* subsidies or aid to the poor.
And by the way, the poor almost never have the option, on any given day, or either accepting a significant raise or taking a better job. Any conservative who says the poor would rather stay lazy that accept a high paying job because they will lose the food stamps, section 8, Obamacare and Obamaphone is doing no more than repeating the latest Fox News "let's whip up our base into a frenzy". The way the "undeserving, lazy" poor can increase their income is if the take a second job, work 60-70 hours a week.
So as I say, this issue has already been addressed by economists who have already studied the issue.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116613/obamacare-critics-still-tell-just-one-side-jobs-story
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/14/stupidity-in-economic-discourse/?_php=true&_type=blogs&module=BlogPost-Title&version=Blog%20Main&contentCollection=Opinion&action=Click&pgtype=Blogs®ion=Body&_r=0
We should understand Kelly's final quote about Democratic spin is in fact furious spin itself, entirely distorting the findings of the CBO.
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