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1) Our Disabled Economy - 3 Million More Americans on Disability |
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An unexplained mystery in the economy is: where are the millions of young men missing from the labor force?
The number of workers classified as “not in the labor force” understandably spiked during the covid lockdowns, but never returned to pre-pandemic levels after the economy reopened.
How are these workers surviving without an income?
The number of people not in the labor force with a disability was flat from the end of 2014 through the end of 2020, then also began rising in 2021. |
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Even if those on disability ARE in the labor force, the data show that these people are much less likely to be employed, they work fewer hours, they’re less productive, and they earn less.
Three Million More Workers Claim to Be Disabled |
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In many parts of the country, disability pays handsomely. For a family of four in Washington, D.C., total government assistance (both cash and in-kind) is the equivalent of a job paying $120,000. In many other states, the cash and in-kind benefits from not working reach $80,000.
The program discourage employees from getting back on the job, because working too many hours or earning too much disqualifies the worker and his family for most handouts.
How can it be that as the work we do is less onerous and back-breaking all the time (thanks to reduced manual labor), more people are claiming to be disabled?
Fraud is also rampant. The Washington Post reports that fraud in the veterans disability program has been steadily rising. |
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2) Illinois Puts the Dilbert Principle in Action |
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“The Dilbert Principle explains that companies tend to move incompetent employees into management roles.” |
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Regular readers of the HOTLINE know that Chicago’s public schools are a disgrace that borders on child abuse. Dozens of schools are such miserable failures that not a single child can read or do math at grade-level proficiency.
So what has the teachers union done? The Chicago Teacher Union president, Stacy Davis Gates, has just gotten… a promotion!!
No, sorry, this isn’t some kind of sick joke. It’s sick, yes, but not a joke.
CTU boss Stacy Davis Gates has just been unanimously elected head of the Illinois Federation of Teachers, which dominates statewide education policy. |
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Davis Gates lives in a bubble of denial that Illinois schools are failing. She dismisses disastrous test scores as based in "junk science rooted in white supremacy... you can't test black children with an instrument that was born to prove their inferiority." (She conveniently sends her own son to a private school.)
A new poll shows the union she heads has a statewide approval rating of just 22%. One reason is its extremism. Another is that most of its funds are diverted to politics and overhead: |
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Whatever happened to putting kids first? |
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3) Refill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve? |
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Yesterday, Donald Trump announced one million barrel a day purchases of oil for the SPR.
The price has fallen to $58 a barrel which is the lowest price in roughly five years. Recall that Biden pulled about 250 million barrels out of the reserve due to spiraling oil prices in 2018 and 2019 - which of course was due to his own anti-drilling policies.
Meanwhile, China is building up its oil reserves - as the chart below shows. Not long ago we had 250 million barrels more in reserves and now they have 50% higher reserves than we do. |
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On the other hand, we have massive reserves of oil in the billions of barrels in the ground underneath us, while China has barren fields.
We will leave it to readers to decide whether now is the right time to be refilling the SPR. We’re agnostic on the question. |
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4) Schumer's Big Lie About Obamacare and Health Care Premiums |
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The Schumer Liberals are running around the newsrooms screaming that Americans will face giant premium increases if the CR passes and the government is reopened, but these two things are almost completely unrelated.
Yes, health care costs have become unaffordable thanks to the collapse of Obamacare (aka, the Affordable Care Act). But the expiration of the Obamacare COVID credits only accounts for 3% of expected 2026 premiums. The rest is due to the failure of Obamacare in controlling costs.
From our friends at the Paragon Health Institute: |
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Preliminary 2026 benchmark rate filings reveal that the expiration of Biden's COVID Credits, a temporary pandemic measure enhancing subsidies for ACA enrollees, accounts for only 4 percent of the expected 20 percent average premium increase next year. In other words, the sharp jump in premiums cannot be blamed on the phase-out of the enhanced subsidies. The real drivers are the same structural flaws that have plagued Obamacare since 2014 and rising health care costs.
The bottom line: Obamacare should be repealed and replaced with free market health care. |
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5) Will D.C. Bureaucrats Shut Down a Popular Rideshare Platform? |
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It's been a decade since Uber finally won the right to legally offer rideshares in heavily regulated Washington D.C., but bureaucrats there are still smarting from having failed to stop it.
So in 2020, when a new ride-hailing service called Empower entered the D.C. market, it faced an even more hostile reception. Drivers loved that it "empowered" drivers to work for themselves, set their own fares, and collect 100% percent of the proceeds--only paying Empower a flat monthly rate to use its software. Users benefit from fares that are on average 20% less than Uber or Lyft. It gets rave reviews.
Empower insists it's not actually a ride-hailing service like Uber or Lyft, but rather a technology provider that allows independent drivers to connect with customers, much as people use Expedia or OpenTable to make reservations.
The bureaucrats disagree and insist Empower bend the knee and accept strict regulations on insurance and other issues. This month, a local judge finally told owner Joshua Sear he would jail him for contempt of court if he failed to shut down in D.C. |
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Sear has agreed to shut down - sort of. He will break all of his contracts and offer Empower's software to drivers for free so they can keep driving. A judge will decide soon if that will fly.
The sad irony of this story is that the restrictions on Empower’s low cost model will only make the lowest income DC residents pay more for transportation.
Thankfully, Empower remains open for business in New York City, Baltimore, and Winston-Salem, N.C. as it negotiates with local officials. Hopefully, it will be coming soon to a city near you. |
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