Obamacare and Jobs

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

You can find some background discussion at Talk Politics. Essentially, there was a report that some people may work less because they would not be bound to their jobs for health insurance, leaving more people free to pursue other ends. The Republicans declared that this is an example of Obamacare costing Americans jobs. Others see it as a benefit - more freedom for workers.

ETA: Ross Douthat has a good column on the issues.

Comments

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

It's still incredible that the left somehow believes the individual market didn't exist prior to the ACA.

It's also incredible, although predictable, that the left sees more people reliant on taxpayer money as a positive for society when the subsidies are brought up in response to the first.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

But the people/workers are taxpayers too, and no less importantly, they contributed to the making of the wealth of that top 1% (the higher taxpayers), and it looks like workers are just getting more for their effort, and liberals don't think this is a bad thing. Liberals, I suppose, don't believe that it is important that the owners and the 1% get as much cream from the economy as they can possibly skim, and that it is illegitimate that workers get some of the benefits of their labor.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

But the people/workers are taxpayers too

And now they are less so than they were before, or so is projected.

and no less importantly, they contributed to the making of the wealth of that top 1% (the higher taxpayers)

This isn't even relevant. Even if it were, I don't see how making them more reliant on the 1% (the same 1% the left wants to diminish) is a benefit.

and it looks like workers are just getting more for their effort

Don't make the error of looking at productivity as a measurement of anything. Productivity is increased by things like automation and advances in technology, it doesn't make the individual worker more productive. There's a reason wages are paid on value and not productivity.

Liberals, I suppose, don't believe that it is important that the owners and the 1% get as much cream from the economy as they can possibly skim, and that it is illegitimate that workers get some of the benefits of their labor.

No, liberals merely apparently have a tenuous understanding of the economics of the worker/employer relationship, do not believe wages are just compensation for labor on their own, and are stuck in an old style of thinking, unable to come up with new ideas for a modern economy.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

unable to come up with new ideas for a modern economy.

New ideas like what? That all (or most of us) join the entrepreneurial/ownership ranks?
We definitely need an economic arrangement that doesn't keep the vast majority down
as a wage-slave caste while permitting those at the top to live and rule as pharaohs.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

New ideas like what? That all (or most of us) join the entrepreneurial/ownership ranks?

That's incredibly old thinking, and is arguably the lynchpin of socialist/progressive thinking from close to a century ago or longer, depending on when you want to start the clock.

Understanding that there's a role for everyone in the economy and that some of those roles aren't ownership might go a long way in left wing economic thinking on the matter of jobs and wages. Instead, we're stuck having conversations about the extras and not paying attention to the issue of value in the economy. I don't want to believe that this is by design, because I want to think better of the left on this issue.

We definitely need an economic arrangement that doesn't keep the vast majority down
as a wage-slave caste while permitting those at the top to live and rule as pharaohs.

So, capitalism? That's the best you're going to get, since the exact opposite of it, socialism, assumes everyone (except for those who are in privileged leadership positions and/or are favored by the power structure) will be kept down in the "wage-slave caste."

Better to have a system that rewards work, provides benefit for those workers or activities that provide extra value, and offers a more objective system of figuring out the economic winners and losers, right?

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I don't think socialism is the opposite of capitalism. I would say communism is, the outright denial of private property. I see socialism as a way to steer between those two extremes. Indeed, we necessarily live in one variant of socialism or another, as we have never really seen a purely capitalist or purely communist state, and such a thing probably cannot exist.

Better to have a system that rewards work

That's the key to this discussion, I think. We want to see work better rewarded, and this development with the ACA seems to do that, by giving more workers greater liberty to plan and pursue their ends.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I don't think socialism is the opposite of capitalism. I would say communism is, the outright denial of private property. I see socialism as a way to steer between those two extremes.

You see a lot more sunlight between the two than most, I suspect. That you see socialism as the middle ground is really the stranger portion of the two, the sort of "mixed economy" we see in the US is surely more representative of the middle, no?

That's the key to this discussion, I think. We want to see work better rewarded, and this development with the ACA seems to do that, by giving more workers greater liberty to plan and pursue their ends.

The ACA is actually doing the opposite, as this CBO estimate demonstrates. It's creating less work, and less reward (except for the handful of people who are now somehow to be rewarded for not working or working less).

The United States does not lack in entrepreneurial spirit. It's argued by some that the European safety net that we're slowly trying to emulate doesn't result in more entrepreneurship there (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-06/will-obamacare-inspire-small-business-ownership-.html). The ACA isn't about greater liberty to pursue any ends, it's never been a problem to begin with here.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Got to agree with Hard Blue here. Socialism is not capitalism's opposite.

Better to have a system that rewards work, provides benefit for those workers or activities that provide extra value, and offers a more objective system of figuring out the economic winners and losers, right?

I would agree with that. I also maintain that unfettered capitalism is not the way to do this. A society must moderate the more severe outcomes of unfettered capitalism or we get, well, what we have today, a growing pharaoh class and growing poverty at the bottom as the wealth is directed upward. After all, those in the upper traunches of the 1% are not working; no actual work is that renumerative. They are collecting rents.

Capitalism is good, as you say, at determining "economic winners and losers"; it is not good, though, at determining the most stable and sustainable distribution of resources. That's where that bugaboo socialism must enter the picture, to prevent an unchecked race to the top from becoming the event that topples a top-heavy economy.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

A society must moderate the more severe outcomes of unfettered capitalism or we get, well, what we have today, a growing pharaoh class and growing poverty at the bottom as the wealth is directed upward.

So wait. Our heavily regulated market is considered "unfettered capitalism" in your mind?

This is what I don't get. Every regulation, every attempt to steer the economy? Those benefit the top. The "pharoah class" exists not because the capitalism is "unfettered," but because the "fettering," as it were, is inevitably something that only the pharoahs can handle. The result you want to avoid is caused by the rules you prefer.

Capitalism is good, as you say, at determining "economic winners and losers"; it is not good, though, at determining the most stable and sustainable distribution of resources. That's where that bugaboo socialism must enter the picture, to prevent an unchecked race to the top from becoming the event that topples a top-heavy economy.

Wow. That's pretty much the exact opposite of everything we know about economics.

Tell me, when there's a natural disaster and price controls are put on water, what do we find? Do we find fair distribution, or do we find shortages? Were the gas panics of the 1970s solved by rationing?

[madscience.livejournal.com]

Of course it existed before; it just wasn't affordable. It's even less affordable now, but now there are subsidies.

And it's not the reliance on taxpayer money that is seen as positive. It's the fact that the money in question is being taken from the people who stole it and given to the people who earned it. (And then they give it back to the people who stole it, in exchange for a product of dubious value.) Ideally, we'd destroy the means by which it was stolen in the first place, and redistribution would become unnecessary. But that's a ways off yet.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

It's still incredible that the left somehow believes the individual market didn't exist prior to the ACA.

Its entirely credible to anyone who shovels a glimpse into the ditch. I had a pre-existing condition that priced my private insurance at 2500 per month.

Now its <$400 because ACA doesn't allow them to discriminate as much against me for pre-existing conditions.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Well, it's now $400 because the other $2100 is being paid for by everyone else.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Again, Jeff, price does not reflect supply and demand in the case of medical care, just gross profits on care by those that artificially restrict supply.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

So there are 310 million or so people. How many insurance policies are there?

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

I was referring to the AMA and pharma companies, not the insurance companies. This time.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Okay, we're talking insurance companies in this thread.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

If there was data showing lower middle income earners were taking money they saved on exchange purchased plans and then used it to open up retirement savings accounts, conservatives would accuse the ACA of undermining people's confidence in Social Security.

[trog.livejournal.com]

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that Ross Douthat essay link. It's great. And the notion we'd be down to a 15 hour workweek by now? Amazing. I knew there has been a drive for a 32 hour work week, because it increases productivity (some companies fully embraced the notion when studies showed them that was indeed the case). But the idea of a 15 hour workweek? I have never heard that before. So thanks.

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

The four-hour work day has been an oft-spoken ideal, I think.
Personally, I don't even know if it should have to be shown that
it increases productivity. Of course, we want a minimum level of
productivity so that we can live in some security and ease, but this
might be more easily achieved if so much of the benefit of work
were not taken up by the owners and leaders.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

I knew Kellogg's cerals did it. (http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?KelloggWorkWeek)

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

That is surprising. Leave it to the era of Reagan
to help bring such experiments to an end. We must
not be disabused of the notion that life is harsh and
backbreaking, or else we might only get more ideas.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Personally, I don't even know if it should have to be shown that it increases productivity.

Actually, studies looking into this were conduct a hundred years ago. William Kellogg did such research, and found not only that productivity increased, but economic activity in the community outside the factory increased as well, making for more sustainable and rewarding activity.

Addendum: From this site (http://climateandcapitalism.com/2009/05/31/whats-wrong-with-a-30-hour-work-week/):

One of the least known flirtations with the 30-hour work week was by the cereal giant, W.K. Kellogg Company. In 1930, the company announced that most of its 1500 employees would go from an 8-hour to a 6-hour work day, which would provide 300 new jobs in Battle Creek. Though the shorter work week involved a pay cut, the overwhelming majority of workers preferred having increased leisure time to spend with their families and community. [16]

New managers who began running Kellogg had no enthusiasm for the shorter work day. They polled workers in 1946 and found that 77% of men and 87% of women would choose a 30-hour week even if it meant lower wages. Disappointed, management began examining which work groups liked money more than leisure and began offering the 40-hour week on a department-by-department basis.

How long did it take them to get rid of the 30-hour week? Almost 40 years! The desire to have more time to themselves was so strong that it was not until 1985 that Kellogg was able to eliminate the 30-hour work week in the last department.

The experience at Kellogg indicates that it is absolutely false to say that all workers all of the time crave more stuff and will sacrifice anything to get it.

From the CS Monitor (http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2009/0508/p09s01-coop.html):

It's not likely that all those Kellogg workers spent their extra 10 hours a week on self-enrichment and civic-improvement projects. But with reduced income they had to find things to do outside the consumer culture, whether it was going to the library or starting family canning projects. The reduced hours and reduced income actually helped to enrich their lives.

As Thoreau put it, "Most of the luxuries, and many of the so-called comforts of life, are ... positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind."

[hardblue.livejournal.com]

I find it particularly intriguing that this should have been happening
during the Cold War period, when we were most zealous about
our differences with Soviet communism. In any case, it obviously
did not win out, and maybe it could not.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

It was a private company's decision, so no conflict.