American Idle: Should the Government "Create" Jobs?

California has regulated itself to its current situation.  It's a crazy situation.  I almost took a job in San Jose in 1999, height of tech boom.  Then I looked at the housing markets.

Well, I certainly don't want us to become communistic, but I do think we make it way too easy for people to choose not to work. Seems like a huge segment of the population believe that they're entitled to what others earn. Pride in accomplishment and personal responsibility seem to be missing in too many people.

Our mess needs to be attacked from so many different angles - government waste being one of the biggest. But then (for instance) if our government agencies no longer threw away all the office supplies on hand at the end of their fiscal year so that they wouldn't have their budgets cut for lack of "need" - what about the people who produce the new office supplies? They'd be out of luck!

So, someone in our society profits even from things we see as waste...

And that's just one for instance.

Since everything is interwoven, changing it will either have to be a gentle transition or a major upheaval. And that, as you said, will cause suffering.

Well, it already is - how many jobs were terminated today? Did I read 7,000?

One thing I know for certain. I'm glad I'm not the one who has to make a final decision on the changes to come. On the other hand, it would be fun to be part of a brainstorming group - discussing "what if" it happened this way or that way.

Janet ... I don't expect that our State of California will actually have any job openings soon.  Whether our US government should be in the business of creating jobs is another thing. If $850 billion in stimulus is just getting money into the economy, that's not enough and won't work. If the government invests, it should be to help creatives businesses get their mojo back, with a result that those businesses would turn around and hire folks again.  Thanks for the post. Harrison

A great Cal Thomas column this morning. Excerpt:

"Generally, one jump-starts a car when th battery is dead, but America's "batteries" (its people) are not dead. The vehicle has stalled because too much government meddling and loss of personal responsibility has flooded the engine. More meddling will not revive the U.S. economy any more than holding down the accelerator on a flooded engine will start a car."

The article went on to suggest that only providing incentives to businesses and families to reinvest in the economy will help.

Cal Thomas is a columnist for Tribune Media Services - today's column was in the Spokesman-Review. If you can find it, the whole thing is worth a read.

I love all the insightful comments on this thread - Thanks, Janet, for starting this discussion!

Lenin must be rolling over in his grave with laughter!

I'm up in socialist heaven - Toronto, Canada where our so called Conservative Federal government  is about to go down the same road as every other western government of late with a new budget this afternoon aimed at stimulus and job creation.

The problem is we keep letting them do this do this to us.

Envy is an unfortunate human disorder that we all suffer from. Politicians and bureaucrats are very skillful at manipulating this emotion. They tell us that because someone else has something that we do not we are entitled to the same and the government is going to provide it. What they don't tell us is that they will be skimming off the top to pay their own salaries, expense accounts and let's not forget about the gold plated pension plan. 

We have a tunnel in this city that was supposed to be another arm of our subway system that was started in the recession of the 90's under a government jobs incentive program. It now sits in mothballs because projected ridership levels did not make it viable. A complete waste of money. Did it create jobs? Yes for a bunch of unionized workers whose leadership turned around and donated funds to politicians election campaigns.

The only certainties to evolve from todays government "stimulus" will be inflation and economic slavery for future taxpayers some of whom will not be old enough, or perhaps not yet born to have had a say in this fraudulent behaviour. I'm British, this is the way we spell it....ok

What's the one of best hedges against inflation?  You guessed it  - REAL ESTATE

For anyone interested pick up a copy of "Animal Farm" by George Orwell. Still as accurate and relevant as it was when it was written.

01/27/2009 3.10pm by John Lavin  www.johnlavin.ca

While many benchmarks of today are not nearly as bad as during the Great Depressiosn, there are many different factors in play today that also didn't exist back then: new/larger entitlement programs, massive national secuity expenses and needs, a global economy where unskilled/low-skilled workers will primarily be in developing countries, a global economy whereby even skilled and educated workers can sometimes be outsourced, a health care burden for older americans that is ever increasing due primarily to advanced in technology, tax redistribution policies that penalize cities and inner-ring suburbs and the ramifications of that, and if implications of global warming ultimately have a serious consequence (the economic impact over the next 50-200 years will be incalculable) and the list goes on.

I think we are at a crossroads with so many major issues to face simultaneous that part Obama's speech that talked about shared sacrifice and responsbility will be nothing like our country has ever seen moving forward.

I'm not all doom and gloom, but I do think that until a better model (politically and economically) is developed, there are so many competing interests out there (lobbyists, class, and the list goes on) that to confront those challenges they way they should be will be very, very hard to do, and I think it's easier for everyone to wish that they either go away or nibble around the edges.

Heck, you had John McCain saying as late as 3 months ago that the "fundamentals of the economy were strong."  If this mentality is the kind of leadership in "some" of our elected officials, it makes me scratch our heads that this statement, as well as others who should have seen this train wreck coming from a long distance, cannot solve this problem.  The fact that the first 350b was mostly a waste of money (in my opinion) as it was little/no accountability, then what does that make for the larger issues?

I do think Obama will do an 800x better job than the last eight years, which was an unmitigated disaster of our fixed/limited resources that were blown and unrecovered during a time of unprecedented change.

All that said, I myself (as well as others who live in this fabulous country) have in the past, and will in the future, seek a way to re-invent itself for the betterment of the next generation, and I think that will happen, it just probably won't happen in the timeframe or manner in which past generations have.

To answer your last questions:  I dont' think there is a better alternative presented at this time to try and stop/slow the rapidly increasing downard spiral.  If someone has a suggestion, I would love to hear it, as the top minds in this country of all political (and economic) stripes, don't have any better ideas.

I think to leave the market to it's own devices will only benefit those with serious capital and resources to survivie and invest.

Yes, creating jobs by creating more government jobs is first cousin to the bail outs.

I think it's also first cousin to welfare, because even though the government workers do pay taxes, it takes a lot more private sector workers to pay the taxes to pay their salaries.

What's the least taxes someone can pay? 15% maybe? Then it takes about 6 or 7 other people earning similar wages to hire one government worker.