CNS News reports on the disappointing job numbers.
Excerpt:
The economy added only 74,000 non-farm jobs in December, the fewest in three years. Yet the unemployment rate dropped 0.3 points to 6.7 percent — the first time in 60 months it has dropped below 7 percent, the Labor Department announced on Friday.
With so few jobs added, the jobless rate still went down because people stopped looking for work.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics says the number of unemployed persons declined by 490,000 to 10.4 million in December, indicating that many of them dropped out of the labor force.
The government counts people as unemployed only if they are actively searching for work.
[…]In 2013, job growth averaged 182,000 per month, about the same as in 2012, when it averaged 183,000 a month.
I am thinking about whether the Obama administration has done anything in the last 5 years to create any jobs. I know they could have suspended the employer portion of payroll taxes. They didn’t do that. They could have allowed the Keystone XL pipeline. They didn’t do that. They could have repealed Obamacare so that employers didn’t have to reduce worker hours to avoid having to pay penalties. They didn’t do that. They could have stopped borrowing over a trillion dollars a year. They didn’t do that.
So I am just wondering what exactly this government has done to create jobs. I know the economy is resilient, and some jobs get created every month, no matter what. But I would like someone to tell me how this government has encouraged the private sector to hire more workers. I think if they had done anything to specifically address jobs, then I would know about it.
The video above shows a typical Democrat reaction to Obamacare’s side-effect of forcing workers from full-time to part-time work. Let them eat cake!
You don’t need to get paid for 40 hours per week, do you? It’s freedom to follow your passion – you don’t really need the money and work experience, do you?
The College Fix explains how students working their way through college feel about having their workers hours cut to comply with Obamacare.
Here’s an example from their article:
Emily Klug, 22, a psychology and sociology major at the College of the Ozarks in Branson, Mo., is another Obamacare victim.
Klug’s university offered her a work-study program over the summer, which she turned down in order to accept a full-time summer job for a national retailer. This would have allowed her to pay for the coming year of college, as well as save for grad school. Shortly thereafter, Klug learned that her employer had modified their policies: she would only be allowed to work part-time.
“Their maximum limit happened to be the same one as the Obamacare classification for full-time,” she told The Fix.
She spent the summer working 20 to 25 hours weekly, unable to save for grad school.
“I’m not happy with it,” Klug added, regarding the Affordable Care Act. “I feel that it’s unconstitutional, and an infringement on my rights. I’m not looking forward to either buying insurance or paying the fine. I will probably be paying the fine. It’s my personal choice. That’s what I object to most in Obamacare – my personal choice is removed.”
Yes, but you get free condoms!!1! It’s so worth it! Maybe you could find another job. A job that uses a lot of free condoms!!! You’re free to pursue your passion. It’s about wellness! And if you have an unplanned pregnancy, then abortions and single mother welfare are free! Just follow your heart.
OK. And it’s not just off-campus work that’s being affected, it’s on-campus work, too.
If one job category stands out for bearing a heavy price from ObamaCare-related cuts to work hours, it might be adjunct college faculty.
Among 313 employers now on IBD’s ObamaCare Employer Mandate List Of Cuts To Hours, Jobs that have cut work hours or permanent staff, or shifted to part-time hiring, there are 54 colleges and universities that have scaled back the hours adjunct faculty may teach.
The list also includes 80 public school districts that have cut hours or outsourced the job functions of teacher aides, cafeteria workers and other employees.
Still, the inclusion of a number of community college systems such as Maricopa, Ivy Techand Dallas County means that cuts in adjunct faculty hours now extend to nearly 200 college and university campuses attended by about 1.6 million students.
In lean budget times, many schools became heavily dependent upon modestly paid, part-time faculty members who were ineligible for health benefits. Now, faced with providing the same type of generous coverage offered tenured professors or cutting hours, many see little choice but to cut.
Of a dozen employers added to IBD’s list on Sept. 25, nine are colleges and universities. Of those, eight put new restrictions on adjunct hours. Several also cut work hours for students, a step backward for helping future grads emerge with manageable levels of student loan debt.
They told me if I didn’t vote for Obama, then college students would have a harder time paying for college. And they were right!
More than 300 employers have cut work hours or jobs, or otherwise shifted away from full-time staff, to limit liability under ObamaCare, according to a newly updated IBD analysis.
The ObamaCare Employer Mandate: A List Of Cuts To Work Hours, Jobs now includes 62 private employers and 239 public-sector employers. The list includes 80 school districts that have cited Affordable Care Act costs as a reason for cutting work hours — or in several cases outsourcing functions — of part-time instructional aides, cafeteria workers, custodians and bus drivers.
It also includes 46 universities and colleges — in some cases college systems — that have reduced teaching loads for adjunct faculty.
The 43 entries added to the list in the past two weeks reflect numerous actions taken before the Obama administration announced a one-year delay ofObamaCare employer mandate penalties on July 2. But the list also includes actions taken more recently, such as SeaWorld Entertainment’s decision to limit part-time workers to 28 hours per week, down from 32 hours previously.
Although the mandate won’t take effect until January 2015, fines will be based on employment levels beginning in the second half of 2014 — or earlier.
[…]In addition to SeaWorld (SEAS), 10 other private employers just added to the list include a group home for disabled adults; a YMCA; two private universities; the K-VA-T Food Stores regional supermarket; the Bealls regional department store ; and four restaurant operations.
[…]Workers in low-wage industries clocked the shortest average workweek on record in July, just 27.4 hours, an IBD analysis of the latest available Bureau of Labor Statistics industry data shows.
This low-wage segment covers 29 million private-sector workers, 25% of the total, in about 40 industry groups where nonsupervisors make up to about $14.50 an hour.
While the IBD list of private-sector hour-cutters is quite small to prove otherwise, it does offer clues that can be of help in interpreting official industry data on hours worked.
For example, the workweek at general merchandise stores tumbled from 31.1 hours in December to 29.8 hours in July. The inclusion of Wal-Mart (WMT) and Bealls on IBD’s list point to ObamaCare’s employer mandate as a significant contributing factor.
The average workweek in the hotel and accommodations industry hit a record low in July — lower than in the aftermath of 9/11 or at the bottom of the Great Recession.
In July, the workweek for nonsupervisors fell to 28.8 hours, down from 30.7 hours in March 2010, when ObamaCare was signed into law.
I’m looking forward to the 2014 elections, when we will get to vote again on this after we’ve seen “what’s in the bill”. I don’t think that the media’s blatherings are going to be able to convince people who are working under 30 hours a week that Obamacare was the right way to reform health care policy.
WINTERY KNIGHT 