Examining the Impact of Obamacare on Job Creators and the Economy

1:30pm in 2154 Rayburn House Office Building

Today’s hearing focuses on how the President’s health care law affects job creators and the economy.  It builds on previous hearings conducted during this congress by Subcommittee Chairman Gowdy.

We know that Obamacare makes labor more expensive – it requires employers with at least 50 full-time workers to offer expensive government designed health insurance or pay a $2,000 or $3,000 tax per worker. 

This law will discourage the 63,000 businesses with between 40 and 49 workers from expanding. It will encourage all businesses to replace full-time labor with part-time labor. 90% of employers report that Obamacare will increase their organization’s health care costs.  Although some of the cost increases will be passed to customers, most will be passed onto workers in the form of lower wages and lost job opportunities.  74% of small businesses say the President’s health care law makes it more difficult to hire additional workers.  The Congressional Budget Office projects that the law will lead to 800,000 fewer jobs by the end of the decade. 

A paper by economists at Harvard and the University of Chicago finds that workers most negatively affected by the law are young, female, minority, and those just starting out on their career path. Obamacare increases government employment, particularly at the IRS, where thousands of new IRS agents will be in charge of enforcing compliance with the law’s taxes and mandates. 

According to projections, the greatest percentage growth in federal health care spending comes from the Federal government’s administration of health care.  This means thousands more pages of regulations will be added to the over 12,000 Obamacare regulations already created.  

One part of the law aimed toward assisting small businesses has already failed miserably: Obamacare contained tax credits for small businesses to offer health insurance.  Few businesses have claimed the credits because they are overly complicated and require businesses to fill out 7 separate duplicative forms.  This failure is symbolic of the bureaucratic approach of the President’s health care law.  

I look forward to hearing from business owners about Obamacare’s impact on their businesses and the challenges they face from the law. For these many reasons, tomorrow the House will vote to repeal Obamacare. There is no doubt that our healthcare system needs reform, but these reforms must lower the price of health insurance rather than increasing burdens on employers and workers with higher taxes, more federal spending and more government regulation.