Study: ACA repeal could cost 126k jobs in Ohio

A national study released this week estimates that repealing the ACA will lead to the loss of 2.6 million jobs in the U.S. and 126,000 jobs in Ohio (Source: “Obamacare repeal could cost more than 100K Ohio jobs, report says,” Dayton Daily News, Jan. 6, 2017).

The majority of the job losses, according to the Commonwealth Fund study, would occur in 2019, resulting from a loss of $140 billion in federal funding for tax credits used to subsidize premium costs for people covered by private insurance under the health law, and federal funds used to expand Medicaid to millions of Americans with lower incomes. Total job losses could climb as high as 3 million positions in health care and other sectors by the year 2021, according to the study from the Milken Institute School of Public Health at the George Washington University and the Commonwealth Fund.

“Repealing key parts of the ACA could trigger massive job losses and a slump in consumer and business spending that would affect all sectors of state economies,” said Leighton Ku, lead author of the report.

But Greg Lawson, policy director of the conservative Buckeye Institute, said there’s no reason to panic: “I don’t think there’s any serious consideration that the folks in Congress are going to immediately get rid of all of this. There will be significant reforms that will be forthcoming….but it’s not going to happen overnight like flipping a switch.”