Endlessly changing stories from Christie scandal players somewhat offset by endlessly changing stories of Christie scandal accusers.
Alaska Governor rejects suggestion that his comments were meant as threat to withhold infrastructure funding from local community.
Republicans were close to unanimous on the Sunday shows today arguing that Obamacare creates disincentives to work. That’s their interpretation of that much discussed CBO report that came out last week. This is a classic case where there is something to this argument but that something is actually ugly, distorts the labor market and is simply inhumane. In other words, people need to step back and think about what the hell they’re talking about.
On the issue of disincentives to work, “job lock” and Obamacare, TPM Reader EH has a story about how this actually plays out in real peoples’ lives …
This whole idea that the ACA now creates a disincentive to work makes me physically angry. I’ve been arguing with conservatives since its passage that this was a feature of the law – not a bug. My wife has a genetic disease, Cystic Fibrosis, and until the ACA my career and job options were completely limited by where I could obtain the best group health care coverage.
We’ve talked about “job lock.” But this is a situation I confess I had not thought of or considered. From TPM Reader SS …
Been reading your stories, haven’t seen anyone comment on this additional small aspect of how ACA will play out in real people lives in the messy, real world.
My marriage failed five plus years ago. My ex has always been on my large-group insurance, and we’ve always known individual coverage for her would be impossible or very costly due to a chronic illness. A new job might do the trick, but her efforts to re-enter the workforce after years of freelancing and then raising small children have made that a challenge, both cause it’s always hard and trying to do in this economy.
More on ‘job lock’ from TPM Reader SS …
The affordable care act is going to allow me to finally start my own law firm. For 15 years, I’ve been working at big and mid-size law firms for a lot of reasons, but one of the biggest was the benefits. My husband is 17 years older than me and has a pre-existing condition. I have been reluctant to start my own firm – be a “job creator”, because I would have had to enter the private insurance market and probably pay a fortune for coverage – if I was able to even get coverage for my husband.
We kick off this week’s edition of TPM Book Club with an excerpt from The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee: “Only 4 percent of software developers in the burgeoning app economy have made over a million dollars. Three-quarters of them made less than $30,000. While a handful of writers, actors, or baseball players can become millionaires, many others struggle to make ends meet.”
I was about to link to this story about Michael Sam, Missouri’s All-America defensive end who came out last night just ahead of the NFL draft. Any player who comes out in major league sports is taking a brave step but Sam is doing so at what is likely the most vulnerable point professionally in a pro athletes’ career. So, helpfully, a bunch of NFL execs have come forward anonymously to Sports Illustrated to say, nope, the NFL ain’t ready.
Don’t miss this piece by Dylan Scott on what the recent CBO Obamacare dust-up tells us about the state of the American work ethic. One key point referenced in the piece is that autonomy, the ability to choose your job, move jobs, start your own company is a central part of what Americans aspire to.
We’ve talked a lot about ‘job lock‘. But there’s another part of this equation which Theda Skocpol references. We tend to think of the US (in contrast to Europe) as a nation of small businesses and strivers and entrepreneurs. But that’s objectively not the case, at least in one key sense: the small business and self-employed sectors are bigger in Europe than they are here.
ICYMI: Why do so many conservatives think the American work ethic can’t survive without extra-economic threats and extortion?