Saturday, August 23, 2014

Are You Surprised By This Entirely Predictable, and Predicted, Result?

If so, you're not very bright, and you weren't paying attention when those of us who understand even the slightest bit about economics were telling you this would happen.  You let your slobbering support for an untested man as president overwhelm any reason and common sense you may have had, and now the country will suffer under the weight of your socialist dystopia.  Here's just one more example:
Add the Affordable Care Act – or, specifically, the big-business Cubs’ response to it – to the causes behind Tuesday night’s tarp fiasco and rare successful protest by the San Francisco Giants.

The staffing issues that hamstrung the grounds crew Tuesday during a mad dash with the tarp under a sudden rainstorm were created in part by a wide-ranging reorganization last winter of game-day personnel, job descriptions and work limits designed to keep the seasonal workers – including much of the grounds crew – under 130 hours per month, according to numerous sources with direct knowledge.

That’s the full-time worker definition under “Obamacare,” which requires employer-provided healthcare benefits for “big businesses” such as a major league team.
You refuse to believe that people, and organizations, respond both to incentives and disincentives.  You choose to believe, in the absence of any evidence, that if you add just the right amount of pixie dust and ground unicorn horn to the current mix that everyone will live happily ever after.  And when it doesn't work you complain that those who were right sabotaged you, that people just didn't try hard enough to implement your ideas, that maybe just a little more pixie dust will do the trick.

I may be over here on the side of the road drinking my Slurpee, to paraphrase your Lightbringer Obama, but I'm smart enough to know that you can't wish the car out of the ditch.  I also know that digging isn't going to get it out of the ditch, but that is what you keep trying.

Will you please, just once, ditch your left-wing, authoritarian, top-driven, rose-colored views of how things should work and join the rest of us here in reality?  It's an open invitation.

Update, 8/25/14Here's another set of examples:
Institutions say complying with the Affordable Care Act has caused them to pass on some costs to employees, according to a new survey from the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources.

Since the act began to take effect, some 20 percent of institutions have made changes to benefits in an effort to control associated costs, the survey says. About the same percentage of colleges are considering making changes, or making further changes, in the year ahead. Of those institutions that have made changes so far, 41 percent have increased employees’ share of premium costs...

The new health care law as it relates to higher education made headlines last year, when scores of colleges and universities began to limit adjuncts’ hours so as to minimize their number of full-time employees. Under the act, large employers must offer health care coverage to employees working 30 hours or more per week.

4 comments:

Auntie Ann said...

Next time, the Cubs should just send a van over to Home Depot before a game and pick up some of the guys who hang around outside and take care not to ask too many questions.

allen (in Michigan) said...

See how well reasoning with an overindulged snot of a kid, throwing a temper tantrum because he can't get whatever it is that precipitated the temper tantrum, works out.

Not very, hey? Well that's what you're dealing with when you deal with lefties. The same angry, threatening outbursts, the same cagey manipulativeness, the same clever rationalizations, the same indifference to consequences.

I'm telling you, when you look at lefties through that lens they suddenly make complete sense. Their actions and views are consistent, predictable and, within that framework, rational.

maxutils said...

I agree with your premise ... but should waiting around to roll a tarp onto the field REALLY be a full time job? Admittedly, and I watched the game, they did a ridiculously bad job of doing it, especially when the brief (20 min) storm had been predicted. And why can't baseball players play on wet fields? I understand the raining thing, because a wet grip on the ball is dangerous to the batter...but every other sport does it. At least MLB got it right and granted t SF their appeal, though they wound up losing anyway.

As to incentives and disincentives ...of course you're right... and the best thing we could do without an entire repeal of the ACA would be to FORBID employers from providing insurance ... change it to a stipend so that companies would have to compete for customers ...but that would be doing something sane. And since most employers provide health care *free* ...why would anyone but the sane want that?

Anonymous said...

Darren - do you know how your district is handling substitute teachers and the 30 hour requirement? My wife is a substitute teacher and works almost everyday and has had a few long term assignments. I'm guessing our district is either ignoring the requirement or they are calling a sub day 5.75 hours.