Remember: We actually pay people to report on stuff like this.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), while not exactly non-partisan, doesn’t always see eye to eye with either party in D.C.
Yes, sometimes the effects of proposed Democrat economic policies are so obvious that even the CBO is forced to agree with Republicans.
The CBO just reported that the Democrats plan to raise the minimum wage would cost between 500,00 to a million jobs. Initially.
No. Duh.
At least that many jobs; really, probably more.
“The CBO analysts said their estimate of employment losses was approximate,” says Fox News. “They said the actual impact could range from a very slight employment reduction to a loss of one million workers.”
These are the same economic clowns who put that bright red nose on Obamacare telling us all that it would balance the budget, bring peace to the Middle East, and provide free birth control for Sandra Fluke.
Getting past the fact that I personally know of at least seven people who have told me they’d privately pay for Fluke’s birth control if it meant she’d never become part of a breeding pair, the clowns were recently forced to update their Obamacare estimates saying, well, gee guys: Obamacare is going to cost a lot of jobs.
How many? 2.5 million. Initially.
“Initially” is a big point with any Obama policy.
Because it always seems that those “initial” estimates by the CBO of the economic consequences of an Obama policy are much rosier than the reality.
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And the reality of any Obama policy is usually postponed until after Obama’s out of office.
You think things are bad now?
Don’t worry, you’ll clean up later.
After he leaves.
Who's the clown in charge of this economy anyway?
“The report was released as the Democrat-controlled Senate,” writes Fox, “prepares to debate an Obama-backed proposal to gradually increase the $7.25 hourly minimum wage to $10.10 by 2016.”
So we have the satisfaction of knowing that at a time when the private sector is struggling to create jobs, Obama will guarantee it will get harder for them rather than easier.
And make no mistake: for all the benefit this will give some people, there are real people who will lose their jobs as a consequence. Small businesses will shutdown, with devastating consequences to owners and employees. Some small businesses won’t start at all as a result because owners will have a tougher time making the financing work with increased wage costs.
“This is a slippery slope that could absolutely cause me to shut down and force me into bankruptcy,” Charlene Conway owner of Carousel Family Fun Centers in Fairhaven and Whitman, Mass. told the New York Times.
“I’m not going to pay a 14-year-old $9 an hour with no experience, maturity or work ethic,” she said. “What this does is eliminate the opportunity for young people to get started in the work force,” with her now hiring older people instead of young people for jobs.
Is it worth it for gains many say are illusory or at least questionable?
“Hundreds of thousands of low-skill workers are trying to find a job but can’t,” Michael Strain, a labor economist with the American Enterprise Institute, writes at NRO. “Is it really the right time to raise the cost of hiring and make it harder for businesses to hire them? Some studies say a higher minimum wage will lower employment; some say employment will remain unchanged. Shouldn’t we err on the side of caution?”
Caution? For Obama?
Why in the world would he ever exercise caution?
He won’t have to clean up after himself.
He never does.
Remember: We pay him to do stuff like this.
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