Look Out, She's Got A Knife!

Cathy McMorris Rodgers happily posted this on her Facebook page today:

I just voted to empower people across Eastern Washington that have seen their paychecks cut because of Obamacare’s harmful 30-hour rule. These are moms and dads working to make ends meet, college graduates earning their first paychecks, and cafeteria workers struggling to pay their bills. 

This common-sense, bipartisan legislation replaces Obamacare’s full-time definition with the traditional 40-hour work week -- resulting in more take-home pay, and marking another meaningful solution brought forth by America’s New Congress.

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

In reality, however, that step would lead to fewer hours of work for employees and more part-time work — the exact opposite of what their rhetoric about “restoring” the 40-hour work week implies. 

Recent data provide scant evidence that health reform is causing a significant shift toward part-time work, contrary to the claims of critics. The number of part-time workers who would rather be working full time is shrinking. And there’s every reason to believe that health reform will have only a small effect on the part-time share of total employment. 

More important, raising the law’s threshold from 30 hours a week to 40 hours would make a shift toward part-time employment much more likely — not less so. That’s because only a small share of workers today — 7 percent — work 30 to 34 hours a week and thus are most at risk of having their hours cut below health reform’s threshold. In comparison, 44 percent of employees work 40 hours a week, and another several percent work 41 to 44 hours a week. Thus, raising the threshold to 40 hours would place many more workers at risk of having their hours reduced. In short, it’s the present legislation, not health reform, that threatens the traditional 40-hour work week the legislation’s sponsors say they want to protect.

Let me translate what our congresswoman said.

I just voted to screw over people across Eastern Washington who will soon see their paychecks cut because we raised the 30-hour rule to 40 hours. Moms and dads working 40-44 hours a week to make ends meet, college graduates earning their first paychecks, and cafeteria workers struggling to pay their bills are now susceptible to having their hours reduced to below 40 so their employers will no longer have to provide health care benefits.

The people in Eastern Washington have been stabbed in the back by one of the best.