Boston Herald

Dems push freeloadin­g for all

- By BETSY McCAUGHEY Betsy McCaughey is a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research and a former lieutenant governor of New York state.

Would you rather show up at work on time or stretch out on the sofa and watch TV? Stupid question. Most people punch a clock out of necessity. But progressiv­e Democrats want to make work optional, and to guarantee a slew of benefits to everyone, whether they get off the couch or not. It’s a slap in the face to America’s workforce.

Some 70 Democrats in the House of Representa­tives — more than one-third of the party’s representa­tives — endorsed a plan on Thursday to outlaw private health insurance and force all Americans into a government-run system. Let’s be clear. This plan is not about helping the needy. The plan would rip away medical coverage from half of all Americans, including the 157 million who get their insurance the old-fashioned way — earning it through a job. The plan, dubbed “Medicare for All,” would prohibit employers — even giant companies that self-insure — from covering workers, retirees or their families.

Union workers with goldplated health benefits would have to give them up and settle for the same coverage as people who refuse to work at all. Why work?

Meanwhile, the Trump administra­tion is taking the opposite route — beefing up work incentives. Last week, the president’s Council of Economic Advisers revealed that about half of ablebodied adults who collect benefits, such as food stamps, housing aid or Medicaid, work zero hours, while the nation’s working stiffs pay the tab.

Why should people toil if they can take it easy and get freebies instead? No wonder nearly one out of every five working-age adults collect these benefits. Dependence soared during the Obama administra­tion, while workforce participat­ion plummeted.

The Trump administra­tion wants to reverse this grim trend. The administra­tion is urging states to require able-bodied adults on Medicaid to do something — work, go to school, go to job training, get addiction treatment, take English as a second language or care for a family member. But House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) bashes these efforts as “meanspirit­ed,” and left-wing advocacy groups are suing to stop them.

No surprise. After all, back in 2010, Dems sold Obamacare to a doubting public with the argument that it would allow them to quit their jobs in the “pursuit of happiness.” The Congressio­nal Budget Office warned that the Affordable Care Act would reduce the incentive to work. Astounding­ly, Democrats considered that a positive.

And the prediction­s are coming true. Medicaid rolls are nearing 74 million, and are projected to reach 87 million within a decade.

Congressio­nal bigwigs like Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (DN.Y.) are staying quiet about the Medicare for All proposal. It won’t become law anytime soon. But confrontat­ional progressiv­es like Democratic Party Deputy Chair Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), New York’s newly nominated congressio­nal candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and presidenti­al wannabes Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) are pushing hard for it, showing where the party is headed. They don’t care that employees with on-the-job coverage would be the biggest losers.

People who work hard should have the freedom to spend their earnings on top-of-the-line health insurance, if that’s what’s important to them. Democrats used to be the party of working people. But the party’s fastbecomi­ng their worst enemy.

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