2016 NPEA conference speaker Christian Weller was featured prominently in a piece by Robert Farley of factcheck.org on the potential job losses related to the American Health Care Act.
The office of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi cited a report co-authored by Weller, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, as support for their estimates of job losses related to the GOP health care bill. In a June 9 press conference, Pelosi estimated job losses to be 1.8 million, but a recent independent study by George Washington University expected the loss to be 413,000.
Said Weller: “The AHCA lowers the budget deficit as it cuts spending more than it cuts taxes. This still results in job losses, which means that the economic effect of cutting spending is greater than the economic effect of cutting taxes. This isn’t surprising. The bill would take money away from people, who are most likely to spend it, and give it to people, who are a lot less likely to spend it. The result is a net job loss. ”
Weller thinks estimates of job losses due to the AHCA may actually be understated, in part because they do not account for job losses due to the negative impact the AHCA might have on people’s health (because CBO estimated 23 million fewer people would be insured by 2026 than under current law).
The full story is available at factcheck.org.
Weller is professor of public policy at the McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. He is the author of Retirement on the Rocks, Why Americans Can’t Get Ahead and How New Savings Policies Can Help.
