Work killer.

• Author: Suderman, Peter
• Position: Obamacare and jobs - Brief article

IN DECEMBER, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released a report estimating that Obamacare would shrink America's economy by the equivalent of about 2 million jobs over the next decade.

Despite the headline job-loss estimate, the CBO wasn't really saying that the law would kill off millions of jobs in the sense that employers will fire people or eliminate positions. Instead, as with a previous report estimating a labor force reduction equal to about 800,000 jobs, the CBO predicts that people will scale back their hours or quit work entirely, since the law allows them to do so without losing their access to health insurance.

What this means is that, thanks to Obamacare, the U.S. labor force is likely to be significantly smaller a...