With One Obamacare Part-Time Jobs Myth Debunked,WSJ's Moore Finds Another


Wall Street Journal editorial board member Stephen Moore altered his previous position on the effect of Obamacare on the growth of part-time jobs to push the dubious claim that health care reform will increase part-time work in the future.

On the October 23 edition of Fox News' America's News HQ, co-host Bill Hemmer interviewed Moore on the potential effects of Obamacare implementation on the growth of part-time work. When asked by Hemmer if the law has already played a role in increasing part-time work, Moore responded, “We are going to probably see that number [of part-time employment] rise next year, because that's when the Obama requirements really take effect. In January.”

Moore's position, that Obamacare is not currently increasing part-time work, reverses his previous stance on the subject. Moore has played a significant role in creating and perpetuating the myth that the reform is the driving force behind increasing part-time work.

Since the beginning of 2013, the Wall Street Journal editorial board -- of which Moore is a member -- has published as least four editorials claiming that Obamacare is directly linked to the growth of part-time work at the expense of full-time employment.

Indeed, Moore has repeated these claims directly. In a July 5 WSJ Live segment on the “ObamaCare Jobs Report,” co-editorial board member Mary Kissel asked Moore what was behind the rise in part-time work in the June jobs report. Moore responded, “clearly Obamacare.”

Moore's decision to finally acknowledge facts that have long been noted by professional economists is a welcome change. Unfortunately, his admission came while pushing yet another unsubstantiated claim; that part-time work will increase when the employer mandate -- penalties for which were delayed until 2015 -- takes effect.

In an analysis of the effect of Obamacare on employer practices, economists Dean Baker and Helene Jorgensen noted that initial indications of an increase in part-time work resulting from Obamacare would have materialized by January 2013, “since under the original law employment in 2013 would serve as the basis for assessing penalties in 2014.” Jorgensen and Baker conclude by noting that that in the first few months of 2013, before the mandate was delayed on July 2, “employers [did] not appear to be changing hours in large numbers in response to the sanctions in the ACA.” If this evidence has any implications for the future, there will be no part-time work shift as a result of Obamacare, as Moore suggests.

Indeed, after previously suggesting that the law may cause part-time job growth, Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics, said recently of the part-time work claim: “I don't see it in the data.”

Moore may have stopped perpetuating one Obamacare myth, but his heel turn immediately replaces one spurious claim with another.