Today’s CBO Unemployment Projections Nearly 50% Higher Than Pre-Obamacare Estimates
It’s time for another installment examining Obamacare’s rhetoric versus reality, specifically when it comes to job creation:
CLAIM: “So this bill is not only about the health security of America. It’s about jobs. In its life it will create 4 million jobs — 400,000 jobs almost immediately.”
— Speaker Pelosi at the White House health summit
FACT: In its release of its August budget update, the Congressional Budget Office significantly downgraded its employment projections for the economy over the next five years – see the below spreadsheet providing a quarter-by-quarter comparison of the August 2011 and January 2011 projections. While quarterly data are not available, in January 2010 – before Obamacare passed – CBO estimated that unemployment would average 6.3 percent in 2013, and 5.3 percent in 2014. That compares with today’s CBO estimates, which project unemployment will average 8.7 percent in 2013, and remain at a stubbornly high 7.9 percent in 2014 – nearly 50 percent higher than pre-Obamacare estimates. And once again, today’s CBO report reiterated its prior prediction that Obamacare will further reduce the labor supply by about 800,000 jobs.
| January 2011 CBO Unemployment Projections | August 2011 CBO Unemployment Projections | |
| 2012Q1 | 8.9 | 8.9 |
| 2012Q2 | 8.5 | 8.8 |
| 2012Q3 | 8.2 | 8.6 |
| 2012Q4 | 8.2 | 8.5 |
| 2013Q1 | 7.9 | 8.6 |
| 2013Q2 | 7.7 | 8.7 |
| 2013Q3 | 7.5 | 8.7 |
| 2013Q4 | 7.4 | 8.7 |
| 2014Q1 | 7.2 | 8.5 |
| 2014Q2 | 7.0 | 8.2 |
| 2014Q3 | 6.7 | 7.7 |
| 2014Q4 | 6.5 | 7.2 |
| 2015Q1 | 6.2 | 6.7 |
| 2015Q2 | 6.0 | 6.3 |
| 2015Q3 | 5.8 | 5.9 |
| 2015Q4 | 5.5 | 5.6 |
| 2016Q1 | 5.4 | 5.5 |
| 2016Q2 | 5.3 | 5.4 |
| 2016Q3 | 5.3 | 5.3 |
| 2016Q4 | 5.3 | 5.3 |