Save American Workers Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARR. I thank my friend, the gentleman from Indiana, Congressman Young, for his leadership on this very important issue.

Mr. Speaker, it is an important issue because ObamaCare is hurting American families. It is hurting American employers. It is hurting American workers who are struggling to make ends meet, to put food on the table. This is a bad economy. We continue to suffer from a bad economy despite 5 years having passed after the financial crisis.

The project of ObamaCare--the project of the Affordable Care Act--is really the project of the entire Obama Presidency. It is a project to determine whether or not Big Government can solve big problems. It is a project to determine whether or not the Federal Government can micromanage one-sixth of the American economy. It is a project to determine whether or not it is a good idea to allow the government to take away choices from the American people--from American workers and from American small business owners.

Wages in this country have gone down over $2,300 in the last several years. The labor participation rate in this country--the percentage of working-aged people actually in the workforce--is the lowest it has been in 35 years, and 75 percent of the American people are living paycheck to paycheck. This is not a sign and these statistics are not indicators of a healthy economy. This is a very unhealthy economy.

Why? Why haven't we seen a robust economic recovery in which American families, American businesses, American entrepreneurs, and American workers can achieve the potential that they deserve, can achieve the opportunities, can reach out and take advantage of the American Dream--why is that objective so illusive for so many Americans today?

Unfortunately, we all know people who are currently looking for employment and who are unable to care for their families as they would like. On top of insurance cancelation notices, higher premiums, broken promises, a malfunctioning Web site, and reduced health care choices,

Americans are now seeing as a result of ObamaCare that the law is forcing job creators to cut employees' hours just so that they can comply with the law, just so that they can prevent any kind of sanctions or penalties that they would incur as a result of running afoul of the provisions of the law. Thanks to ObamaCare, millions of these already struggling Americans are having an even harder time finding work, caring for their families, putting food on their tables because, again, ObamaCare is putting full-time work and decent wages out of reach.

Mr. Speaker, we are moving from a full-time work economy to a part-time work economy, and it is largely because of ObamaCare. I speak with small business owners across central and eastern Kentucky all the time, and what they tell me is very consistent: they want to put people back to work; they want to invest and grow their businesses; they want to be able to provide good, quality health care to their employees and to their workers, who are the backbone of the American Dream, who are the backbone of their entrepreneurial success. ObamaCare is holding them back. Employers in my district and all over America consistently cite ObamaCare as one of the top reasons for planned layoffs and their reluctance to hire more workers.

Think about that.

Why on Earth in a down economy--in the worst economy--and with the worst labor participation rate in 35 years would lawmakers in Washington want to punish American businesses--American entrepreneurs, American job creators--for hiring more people? Yet that is exactly what this flawed law does.

This law entangles small businesses in a web of rules and regulations, making it expensive and nearly impossible to invest in new workers.

In particular, ObamaCare's 30-hour rule, which defines full-time work as averaging only 30 hours per week, is resulting in fewer jobs, reduced hours, and less opportunities for so many Americans.

This 30-hour rule forces employers who have been providing coverage--in some cases, for decades--which is good, quality health care, to fundamentally alter their benefit plans, to drop coverage altogether, or shift more of their workforce to part time by cutting workers' hours below 30 a week because they can't afford to offer the health insurance mandated by ObamaCare.

The Wall Street Journal had an editorial and called these the 49ers and the 29ers--49ers because these are businesses that will not hire more than 49 employees because ObamaCare will punish the employer if they hire more than 49 employees, 29ers because employers will not and cannot hire people for more than 29 hours a week.

So these are the 29ers. These are people who are struggling to take care of their families. This is hurting people.

Mr. YOUNG of Indiana. Reclaiming my time, I sometimes like to distill the narrative down to some numbers.

You just mentioned the movement down to 29 hours a week. Let's consider the Kentuckian or the Hoosier who is currently working 39 hours a week, and because of this provision, their employer is unable, under the current economic conditions, to offer them ObamaCare-sanctioned health insurance.

They are incentivized to move that hardworking hourly work down to 29 hours. That is a loss of 10 hours per week. Over the course of a month, that worker is losing an entire work week.

How is an hourly worker that has to pay for food and shelter and clothing and other basic expenditures supposed to take care of their family?

It is imminently unfair, and someone needs to stand up for our low- and middle-income workers. I think that is the essence of what this is all about.

Mr. BARR. Absolutely. I totally agree. You are absolutely right. I would commend the gentleman for being one of those leaders in our country who is standing up for the working people of this country.

I would just note the president of the Teamsters Union, James Hoffa, has said that this rule will ``destroy the foundation of the 40-hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class.''

In short, ObamaCare is hurting the very people that it was intended to help. I don't think this is a partisan issue. There are well-meaning people on both sides of the aisle who want to help working families make it a little easier and get by a little easier and put food on the table and earn a living wage, but this law is punishing people for working hard. Hard work is what made this country great.

Why would we disincentivize hard work? Yet that is exactly what ObamaCare does.

Mr. YOUNG of Indiana. If I could interject because I think you hit on a key point. This isn't ideological. This ought not be partisan at all. In fact, we have a number of Democratic cosponsors. I am gratified by their intellectual honesty, their courage, their support. They are doing the right thing here. They are looking out for their constituents.

We have all been asked to come here and get something done while people are feeling pain. This was certainly an unintended consequence, is my reading. I don't want to impugn the motives of those who hurriedly passed this Affordable Care Act. I don't think they intended this.

So we repeal the provision. We replace it with something that makes sense and restores wages for workers that need it most.

Mr. BARR. Absolutely. This is commonsense reform.

Again, I commend Congressman Young and other colleagues who have sponsored the Save American Workers Act. This is a simple piece of legislation. It would simply repeal the 30-hour definition of full-time employment in the Affordable Care Act, in ObamaCare, and restore the traditional 40-hour definition.

It makes perfect sense. It would help employees who are seeking the hours that they need to take care of themselves and their families. It would lower the burden and the regulatory costs on employers.

It would allow American businesses to be more productive. It will allow American workers to be more productive. It will get to the heart of why our economy is not where it should be today.

I really appreciate the gentleman's leadership on this issue.

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Mr. BARR. I thank the gentleman.

I would like to note a point that the President made in his State of the Union address and, really, why Congressman Young's bill should be a point of agreement for all of us--for the President, for Members of the other side of the aisle, for those of us on this side of the aisle. Here is what the President said in his State of the Union address, speaking to the state of our economy: Inequality has grown, he said, income inequality. Upward mobility has stalled.

That is what the President of the United States said. I agree with the President. Upward mobility has stalled.

Why has it stalled?

Well, one of the reasons, Mr. Speaker, upward mobility has stalled in this country is because we are punishing hard work. ObamaCare is punishing people for working hard. That is what made this country great.

The Congressional Budget Office released a report a few weeks ago, and that report projects that ObamaCare will force 2.5 million Americans to leave the workforce in the next decade.

Think about that. There are Members of Congress who are defending a law that will shrink the American workforce by 2.5 million Americans. And what is the administration's response? They say it is a good thing. They say it is a good thing that Americans are going to be forced to leave their jobs.

So this law does two things: it forces Americans to lose their jobs or leave the workforce, and it forces employers to reduce the number of hours for those who remain in the workforce. This is a prescription for continued economic stagnation.

Now, we have a solution before us. The solution is the legislation H.R. 2575, proposed by my friend from Indiana, Todd Young, the Save American Workers Act. Not only is this proposal good for working Americans--because it would repeal the 30-hour workweek definition and replace it with a traditional 40-hour workweek definition for full-time work--but it would also, according to the Congressional Budget Office, it will create $75 billion in higher cash wages for American workers.

Now, if that is what the nonpartisan CBO says--and we know that wages have been declining in this country; we know that working families are struggling to put food on the table because they are not making enough to make ends meet and to take care of their kids--why on Earth would we not vote in favor of legislation that will create $75 billion in higher cash wages?

I just want to, once again, thank the gentleman from Indiana. I want to thank my friend, the gentleman from Pennsylvania, also for his leadership and the gentleman from Oklahoma who spoke earlier and eloquently shared a story of his constituent.

This is about American workers having the ability to achieve that upward mobility that the President spoke about in his State of the Union. I invite the President to join us. I invite my friends on the other side of the aisle to join us in helping the American workers achieve their potential, reinvigorate the work ethic in this country, allow people to work the way they want to without punishing small businesses and workers for achieving their potential.

At a time when Americans are struggling, we must do everything we can to invest in real solutions like the Save American Workers Act of 2014 that would grow the economy and get the country working again.

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