Offering a blast of common sense, Charles Lane suggests that we do three things to promote job growth: (1) end sugar protectionism and price supports (“In 2006, the Commerce Department estimated that the sugar program cost three confectionery manufacturing jobs for each job it saved in sugar growing and harvesting”); (2) repeal the Davis-Bacon Act, which requires federal contracts to pay the “prevailing” (i.e., union) wage, which now covers roughly a third of public construction spending, at an added cost to tax payers of $8.6B; and (3) reduce the minimum wage. He chides both the president and Republicans for failing to mention any of these in their list of job-creating ideas: “None of these measures alone, or even all three together, would eliminate unemployment. But they might significantly decrease it at a time when every job counts.”
Of course there are powerful special interests defending each of these, especially organized labor, which “argues for Davis-Bacon and the minimum wage with rhetoric about fairness and workers’ rights, despite economic evidence to the contrary.” The White House and Congress are not merely resistant to good ideas for improving the job outlook. They also want to make it worse. Cap-and-trade, card check, and ObamaCare all impose new costs, taxes, and mandates on business. Just as surely as Davis Bacon increases the cost of labor, new mandates to pay for super-duper health insurance for all but a fraction of workers will do so as well. If the minimum wage “prices low-skilled workers out of entry-level jobs,” ObamaCare will price workers at all levels out of jobs. And Midwestern senators have already figured out the job-killing implications of cap-and-trade.
It remains a wonder that politicians don’t seem to connect the dots between their policies and the impact on employment. Or maybe they do and simply don’t care. But let’s be clear: the jobs picture is bleak, and both Congress and the White House should jettison existing barriers to employment and junk agenda items that will make things worse if, as Lane says, ”they’re really serious about putting America back to work.”
“Her best moments came on illegal immigration, when she sounded both tough on enforcement (she says she favors border controls and employer sanctions) but reasonable.”
Wow, that catches my attention. How times have changed. Hillary Clinton realizes that she must at least sound tough regarding the illegal immigration issue. Pollsters are obviously telling her that most Americans want a stop to this nonsense. So much so, Senator Clinton believes it’s worth risking the ire of the avant-garde “Latino community.” I don’t think that would have occurred a year earlier.
Well put, Mr. Thomson. But I despair that the certain victor (McCain) as well as the others share this bizarre disregard for common sense and rule of law and fairness (how embarassingly stupid McCain sounds when he purrs about “humane” solutions to the illegal immigration situation – I suggest he spend a few hours with legal intending immigrants and their US citizen families and acquaintances to get a flavor of the “humane” aspects of this topic).
But Jennifer – what the heck does “but reasonable” mean in this context? The moral and logical inversion that has occurred WRT rule of law and immigration dwarfs even the vile disastrous idiocy of the media and and many “critics” demonizing the US while it fights insane murderous thugs abroad in the GWOT. “Reasonable” would be a darkly amusung concept to a border-county public health official, just to take one example. Jennifer – and other Contentions posters – dwell for a moment upon the concept bound up with the words “Pauline Kael” when it comes to illegal immigration.
Does anyone else wonder how this country can have electricity or feed itself when something as idiotic as the “Afghanistan distraction” can be other than laughed at?? So, I guess we’re Belgium or Spain, not the US? We can’t fight two itsy-bitsy little wars at one time? In WWII Iraq/Afghanistan wouldn’t have even been major theaters of operations, taken together. But 60 years later, with nearly twice the population, 10 times the wealth, and unimaginable advances in technology and communications, we can’t handle two of the weakest, worst-performing enemies we’ve ever faced?
As I ranted about in a previous comment today, this “no military solutions for military problems” delusion is widespread, and not just among the subject illiterates like Clinton. I’ve heard actual military officers express these preposterous thoughts (the only consolation was the astonishment and fury of their subordinates, shared privately later) in one of the current theaters of operations. We’ve got the best large military that ever walked the Earth, but it has many people laboring under the most ridiculous delusions, and one service in particular (which shall remain nameless but wears a washed-out forest digital camo even in the desert) that has many officers who go to astonishing lengths to rationalize not using force.
“As I ranted about in a previous comment today, this “no military solutions for military problems” delusion is widespread…”
Alas, I am filled with self pity. My own term “dishonest pacifism” may well describe this peculiar phenomenon. These folks insist that they are not pacifists. Sometimes they even get irate if you suggest such a thing. Nonetheless, when you talk to them for awhile and flesh out their actual views— they turn out to be lying to themselves.
OMG -now you guys dont even like “one service in particular”.
Maybe you should put the hat around for a nice efficent private army -Blackwater?
Unamerican, who doesn’t “like” a service? Can you read? Or is it a problem of comprehensive ignorance of military affairs?
And what do you know of Blackwater? Has the idiotic media misinformed you to the point that you confuse them with a “private army”? In order to make amends, please explain how Blackwater and kindred firms operate, and list your direct experiences with them. Of special interest would be your understanding of how such firms operate in an offensive mode, acting as a military force and not merely as a reactive security force. Please provide examples from Iraq, if you could.
Idiot.
David – I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing here. I’m referring to a particular sort of soft-headed non-thinking – sometimes looking like aversion to risk and action – that actually has penetrated all the way into command elements in the field. Dishonest pacifism – your trademark phrase – applies to ignorant, cowardly, or idiotic civilians well out of harm’s way. By the way, I’ve always considered that phrase to contain a troubling element, as “dishonest” could imply there is in fact a respectable “honest” version. Like Orwell (but probably far harsher), I don’t cede any moral standing whatsoever to “pacifism” – as it frequently amounts to nothing more than lazy, cowardly moral narcissism (rough men standing ready in the night, etc etc).
She won’t enforce “federal laws”… Can she be trusted to be the POTUS?
Icecold – Im just going out to the desert to look for “the washed out camouflage ‘ guys that are wandering round rationalizing non force.
Im waiting for the Blackwater movie starring Tom Cruise.
“Like Orwell (but probably far harsher), I don’t cede any moral standing whatsoever to “pacifism”
Very few pacifists are logically consistent. Mahatma Gandhi, for instance, sometimes even advocated violence. Take a look at this:
“And suddenly Gandhi began endorsing violence left, right, and center. During the fearsome rioting in Calcutta he gave his approval to men “using violence in a moral cause.” How could he tell them that violence was wrong, he asked, “unless I demonstrate that nonviolence is more effective?” He blessed the Nawab of Maler Kotla when he gave orders to shoot ten Muslims for every Hindu killed in his state. He sang the praises of Subhas Chandra Bose, who, sponsored by first the Nazis and then the Japanese, organized in Singapore an Indian National Army with which he hoped to conquer India with Japanese support, establishing a totalitarian dictatorship.”
—The Gandhi Nobody Knows
Richard Grenier