brassmein -> construction gangbox journal -> issues -> unemployment

Employment and Trade Deficit

Creating Jobs, Same Ol' Song and Dance

For over two years the overall national unemployment rate has hovered around 9 percent and construction unemployment has ranged around 18-22 percent. The unemployment rate for returning veterans is presently at 26 percent (CBS News). That's not the whole story. There are millions who are not counted because they have ran out of benefits, given up or settled for lower pay and longer commutes. The labor department estimates that real employment is actually twice the rate of record.

All the children in Washington are talking about creating jobs as if they could be conjured up by magic. Their ideology requires them to seek their own version of the truth within the confines of party rhetoric. Even if they find it they can sell it only to each other. Over and over they continue the barter on ideas that have not been successful. The meaningless "focus on jobs" phrases they are chanting are like old songs that get stuck in your head. You try to tune them out because they are meaningless.

The liberal lawmakers have tried stimulus with only temporary success. Too little and two late, and now a none starter under the present debt burden and political climate. The conservatives continue to tout the old and tired notion that keeping the Bush tax cuts will solve the problem. Newsflash: It ain't working.

THE BIG WHITE ELEPHANT in the room is the TRADE DEFICIT. The decline of America started over 20 years ago when NAFTA and CAFTA totally decimated employment options for millions of hard working blue collar Americans. We traded our productive manufacturing economy for a service economy where we sell each other our hamburgers. We sacrificed our own economy in favor of a global economy. We sold our soul for cheap Chinese goods and Middle East oil. 1992 presidential candidate, Ross Perot warned us that we would hear the sucking noise as the jobs left the country and now we are feeling the vacuum as never before.

We need government representatives that put the country's interest ahead of politics. We need statesmen with vision beyond the next election. We must have a government that is willing to hold multinational corporations to task. We cannot automatically assume that broad financial advantages to corporations will generate jobs in America. Money has no patriotism.

The United States buys $4.46 worth of Chinese goods for every $1 worth of American goods sold to China.

Is America In Decline? 24 Statistics About The United States Economy That Are Almost Too Embarrassing To Admit

Howard Watkins Aug. 8, 2010

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