In the first two months of the new fiscal year, tax revenues are up. But so is the deficit. Why? Because spending continues to outpace revenues. So why do tax cuts keep getting blamed?
The latest monthly budget report from the Congressional Budget Office shows the deficit jumping $102 billion in just the first two months of the new fiscal year.
That sure looks like the deficit is “soaring,” as one news outlet claimed. But as the CBO makes clear, almost all that deficit increase was the result of quirks of the calendar. Depending on where weekends fall, significant sums of spending can get shifted into different months.
A true apples-to-apples comparison, the CBO says, shows that the deficit climbed by just $13 billion. Continue reading
By Ben Marquis • Conservative Tribune
Some of our readers may recall the massive scandal in 2001 surrounding the bankruptcy of the Enron Corporation, an energy company based in Texas.
Investors lost an estimated $63 billion when investigators discovered that Enron officials and auditors at the Arthur Anderson accounting firm had knowingly and unethically used loopholes in the law and various accounting tricks to hide billions that had been lost in bad deals and debt from shareholders.
Several people ultimately went to jail, and the liberal media used the scandal to excoriate capitalism in general and energy companies in particular. Continue reading
By Erielle Davidson • The Federalist
Harvard Business School recently released a working paper titled “Survival of the Fittest: The Impact of the Minimum Wage on Firm Exit,” discussing the effects of minimum wage policies on companies’ survival. For those with any shred of economic understanding, the results were predictably dismal.
The paper focused specifically upon the restaurant industry in San Francisco, using data from the review platform Yelp to track the activity and performance of individual restaurants. Researchers Dara Lee Luca and Michael Luca discovered that a $1 increase in the minimum wage leads to approximately a 4 to 10 percent increase in the likelihood of any given restaurant exiting the industry entirely. In economic terms, minimum wage hikes quicken a restaurant’s “shutdown” point. Continue reading
By Christopher Jacobs • The Federalist
Last week, Vox ran a story featuring individuals covered by Obamacare, who live in fear about what the future holds for them. They included people who opened small businesses because of Obamacare’s coverage portability, and worry that the “career freedom” provided by the law will soon disappear.
Unfortunately, but perhaps unsurprisingly, Vox didn’t ask this small business owner—who also happens to be an Obamacare enrollee—for his opinions on the matter. Like the enrollees in the Vox profile, I’m also incredibly worried about what the future holds, but for a slightly different reason: I’m worried for our nation about what will happen if Obamacare ISN’T repealed.
What Obamacare Hasn’t Done For Me
Unlike many of the individuals in the Vox story, I am a reluctant Obamacare enrollee—literally forced to buy coverage on the District of Columbia’s Exchange because Washington, D.C. abolished its private insurance market. Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
A business owner told lawmakers on Tuesday that Obamacare has prevented new hiring because health care costs at his company increased by 51 percent.
Thomas Secor, president of Durable Corporation, a small manufacturing company that employs 37 individuals, testified at the House Small Business Committee hearing that the Affordable Care Act has made providing health care coverage for workers more difficult.
“Health care is certainly one of the most vexing problems facing small businesses. The enormous costs and ongoing uncertainty surrounding our health insurance system is a major cause for concern,” Secor said. “As a business operator, I am deeply troubled by the ongoing difficulties our health care system creates for my fellow small-business owners and their employees, and by the fact that the most recent national effort to reform the health care system has done very little to address the costs we, as small-business owners, face.” Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
A manufacturing CEO told lawmakers on Wednesday that costs imposed by the Affordable Care Act had negatively impacted his company’s ability to hire new workers, make capital investments, and develop new products.
Joe Eddy, president and CEO of Eagle Manufacturing Company, testified before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce on behalf of the National Association of Manufacturers, a trade association that represents more than 12 million Americans.
“Manufacturers appreciate your attention to the burdens of the Affordable Care Act that are impacting the competitiveness and growth of manufacturers around the nation,” Eddy said. Continue reading
by Justin Haskins • Philly Inquirer
Shortly after being sworn into office in January 2009, President Obama, along with Democrats in Congress, spent trillions of dollars on government bailouts, stimulus packages, and various social welfare programs – all passed with the promise they would reverse one of the most significant economic crashes the country has experienced.
After nearly eight years in office, though, Obama has failed to deliver on many of his campaign promises and has left America worse-off than it was when he entered the White House.
During the Obama administration, there hasn’t been a single year in which the nation’s gross domestic product grew at 3 percent or higher, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. That’s a first for a modern president. Continue reading
By M.G. Oprea • The Federalist
It’s that time of year. No, not New Years. It’s Obamacare enrollment time—that is, if you’re unfortunate enough to not have employer-sponsored health insurance.
There’s been a lot of media coverage lately about rising premiums. But the headache isn’t just financial, although that’s certainly part of it. With more insurance providers fleeing the individual market and coverage becoming worse and worse, getting the care you need can feel almost impossible.
To illustrate, I’d like to share my own experience buying insurance on the Obamacare exchange and trying to get treated for a chronic health problem. Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
Health care spending in the United States grew 5.8 percent in 2015, hitting a record high of $3.2 trillion, according to the latest estimates from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Last year, health care spending in the United States totaled $3 trillion—or $9,523 a person. This year, per-person expenditures went up to $9,990.
“The faster growth in 2014 and 2015 occurred as the Affordable Care Act expanded health insurance coverage for individuals through Marketplace health insurance plans and the Medicaid program,” the report said.
The federal government is the biggest driver of health care spending and in 2015, 29 percent of the nation’s health care bill was due to the feds. Continue reading
by Bill McMorris • Washington Free Beacon
A federal judge in Texas could strike down another of the Obama administration’s most controversial labor rules.
Judge Amos L. Mazzant from the Eastern District of Texas will rule Tuesday on the Department of Labor’s new overtime regulations. Those regulations would force employers to pay overtime to any white collar worker making less than $913 per week–about $47,000 per year—double the previous threshold of $455. The rule also includes an escalator provision that automatically raises the threshold every three years, similar to how some minimum wage provisions are designed to adjust for inflation.
More than 20 states and dozens of companies and industry trade groups have filed suit to block the regulations from taking effect. Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
The Obama administration could bail out Obamacare insurers through its risk-corridor program, according to an expert from the Mercatus Center.
The risk-corridor program was designed to constrain risk for health insurers who had uncertainty in pricing premiums for new plans they offered through Obamacare. The program was established and administered in years 2014, 2015, and 2016 and transferred funds from profitable insurers to insurers with losses.
In 2014, the risk-corridor program experienced a shortfall of more than $2.5 billion. Poorly performing insurers requested $2.87 billion in that year, while profitable insurers could only make up about $362 million, leaving a deficit of about $2.5 billion. Continue reading
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
Obamacare enrollees had trouble affording and accessing health care as well as understanding how to use their plans, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office.
The top factors that Obamacare enrollees considered when selecting a plan in 2015 were the cost of premiums, deductibles, and copayments.
The auditors talked to stakeholders including policy experts, state departments of insurance, and exchange officials, and found that some Obamacare enrollees said the out-of-pocket expenses were too expensive before reaching their deductible. Continue reading
by Abigail Stevenson • CNBC
If politicians don’t fix the Affordable Care Act, then the vulnerable Blue Cross and local HMO plans — which serve as the backbone of Obamacare — must exit, said Robert Laszewski, the President of Health Policy and Strategy Associates.
“What the politicians need to do is to understand they have got about a year to fix this,” he said in an interview with CNBC’s “Closing Bell.”
Republicans do not want to fix the existing flaws for Obamacare, Laszewski said. Instead, they want to repeal and replace it. He added that Democrats are now stating that they would rather go to a single-payer insurance plan or a public option within a government-run plan. Continue reading
After-tax income has declined for some demographic groups since 2009
by Ali Meyer • Washington Free Beacon
Taxes are consuming a larger share of household income now than before President Obama took office, according to data from the Congressional Budget Office.
The CBO uses a comprehensive measure of income, referred to as average household market income, that includes labor income, business income, capital income, capital gains, and retirement income. It combines this with government transfers to calculate before-tax income.
The budget office then subtracts individual income taxes, payroll or social insurance taxes, corporate income taxes and excise taxes to calculate average after-tax income. Continue reading
By Eric Peterson • The Federalist
Last month, when President Obama’s Department of Labor released its long-awaited “overtime rule,” the mainstream media headlines were predictable: “Obama administration announces final overtime rule boosting pay for millions,” said the Los Angeles Times. “New overtime rules a boon for middle class workers,” added Newsweek. With claims from the Obama camp that the new mandate will boost pay by $12 billion over the next decade, the majority of the coverage has been overwhelmingly positive.
But here are a few headlines we might have seen if media outlets made an honest assessment of the rule: “Overtime rule to cause more than 4,000 cleft lip surgeries to not be performed for children in need”; “At-risk youth could see fewer programs because of costly DOL rule”; “Domestic abuse nonprofit faces cuts because of Obama’s overtime rule.”
Those may not have been headlines atop major newspapers, but they are real concerns nonprofit organizations submitted to the Department of Labor while the overtime rule was undergoing consideration over the past year. Continue reading