How President Obama can create jobs...

el canadiano said:
Foreigners only own about 4 of the 14 trillion dollars of the US debt, roughly.

http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/21/who-owns-america-hint-its-not-china/
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But the "non-foreigners" domicile their corps and their incomes offshore, and buy politicians who put the tax burden on the lower- and middle classes. By far the largest portion of the capital being generated in this country is free of taxes. Ask Warren Buffet, or any of the rest of the usual suspects.
 

http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/why-government-cant-create-jobs/
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5654
http://thomasmullen.blogspot.com/2010/09/government-cant-create-jobs-and-it.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/025554_government_debt_wealth.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/schiff/schiff137.html
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/08/24/why-government-doesnt-create-j
http://theuklibertarian.com/2010/01/25/the-government-cannot-create-jobs/
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinio...point-plan-to-create-American-jobs/50265720/1
http://drpinna.com/can-a-government-create-jobs-19684
http://senatorwagner.com/2011/07/business-farms-create-jobs-not-government/
http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/no...contributor-his-government-worker-mom-drain-s

Please keep in mind, this assumes that we desire a non-socialist, free market economy. The inescapable conclusion is that government cannot create jobs, because it cannot create wealth. It confiscates wealth, so every public sector job paid for by transferring wealth from the private investment sector to the public sector is a drain on the job creating potential of the private sector.

What government can do is act to create a positive or negative job creation environment by its level of intrusiveness or lack thereof.
 
I guess that means that you want to abolish taxation altogether and have toll roads everywhere, or ??? How does that work? There are PLENTY of people LOOKING for work in this economy... they're not all scum or bums. Many are highly qualified. Where are the jobs? They're overseas paid at slave-wage levels. Corporate farms create jobs, but they are not a living wage for the most part (except for the multiple layers of executives and their jets and bonuses). Occam's razor cuts deeply on the populace. I'm definitely for less CROOK-INFESTED government... across party lines... I'd like to see government management that includes a bit of clear-eyed compassion... not bleeding heart, but simply extending a hand up for someone who wants it.

A properly managed government CAN create jobs but we haven't seen properly managed government for decades (if ever).

And to me there is a clear distinction between competent management within government and all of the shyster payola that currently riddles the system so thoroughly and bleeds the resources that could otherwise go to gainful employment opportunities. The two-party system, when both are funded essentially by the same few corporations and their minions, is giving us what we have now.

Anyway, back to the job I do have! :rolleyes:
 
This is a really simple question.

Government has X workers fulfilling its constitutionally limited functions. How does government create >X jobs?

Government doesn't create wealth, so who pays for those jobs? The money is confiscated from the private sector, correct?

Government can't experience success that leads to greater income, so there is no organic, success-driven growth, correct?

If government DOES grow to >X, it has to do so by further confiscatory taxation, depressing the private sector economy and growing government beyond its constitutionally limited role, becoming far more pervasive and invasive.

You've all heard the phrase, "it takes money to make money". Its true. Money properly invested is money that grows. Wealth is created in the private sector.

In the public sector, money is collected via taxation and simply spent.

Need proof? Look no further than Warren Buffett. Regardless of his cheap words, his actions prove the point. Did he write a big check to the government? Hell no. Because there is no return on his investment. But he left money to GE and made bank.

Follow the money. It doesn't lie.
 
Here's how I see it Fred in simple terms.

When everyone hoards there is no cash flow in the economy. Unless this pattern is broken, there is a downward spiral that can lead to a depression. To break the pattern the Government creates public projects -- roads, bridges, etc. This creates jobs. Workers pay income tax, and that brings in revenues for the government. At the same time, they become consumers. This has a multiplying effect as businesses make profits, hire more people, more pay taxes, more spend. And voila! The economy is revived.

So rather than cut spending, as Republicans propose ( they want the economy to fail under Obama so they can grab back power), the government needs to spend more to revive the economy, and that ultimately creates more jobs in the private sector.
 
Fred Sherman said:
The inescapable conclusion is that government cannot create jobs, because it cannot create wealth. It confiscates wealth, so every public sector job paid for by transferring wealth from the private investment sector to the public sector is a drain on the job creating potential of the private sector.

What government can do is act to create a positive or negative job creation environment by its level of intrusiveness or lack thereof.
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Hmmm....but government spending is one of the factors used to calculate Gross Domestic Product. Seems to me that means, by definition, government can create wealth. If so, then your major premise is not true. What I don't understand is how you get to the conclusion that the solution to unemployment has something to do with "level of intrusiveness." (I don't want to misstate your position, so if I am not understanding this, let me know- but, I have heard some folks talk in similar terms and it seems to be linked to some idea of government regulatory agencies choking off jobs). What I have not heard is evidence that supports this idea. Are you aware of any?
 
jadmperry said:
Hmmm....but government spending is one of the factors used to calculate Gross Domestic Product. Seems to me that means, by definition, government can create wealth.
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Simple application of mathematical logic and applied combinatorics.

Given that A + B = C; where A is private sector wealth, B is public sector spending and C = GDP.

If Z is the aggregate tax rate of the US government on the public sector wealth, then B = A/X;

Therefore GDP = A + A/X or GDP = (AX + A)/X

What that shows is that:

1. Government spending does not add to the GDP. Taxation is a transfer of private sector funds to the public sector. There is no created wealth. No product is sold, no services or gods provided.

2. Taxation (X) fractionalizes public sector wealth, therefore reducing job growth.

Politicians lie. Math doesn't.
 
Do you mean Z or X, above? The math does not appear to work.

It appears you are conflating taxation with government spending. Para. 1, starts with a conclusion about Govt. spending and then jumps to a definition of taxation. I assume you agree the two are not the same.

What I take away from this is an argument that taxation is an issue in "reduced job growth." Without going into the merits of that point, it seems a completely different issue than government spending.
 
Governments - at least ones that actually follow their Constitution (if they happen to have a decent one) don't just spend, they may also invest.
Given that, then it's a matter of what they invest IN, and looking at the ROI just like any other investing entity. Busted highways are more expensive (but the car repair and car sales lobbies may cynically push this agenda as it may boost their annual report bottom lines, as an example).

An efficiently and ethically run government that makes prudent investments in infrastructure and other capital investments that stand to make society more productive and run more efficiently.
Unfortunately far too many people IN government like to rig the game so most of the capital collects at the top, offshore, and free of American taxation.

I disagree that taxation is a priori evil. Only imprudent and/or unfairly applied taxation is.

BTW, please do not presume that I am trying to use these arguments to defend either major party in the U.S., I am not. They are both "fed" from essentially the same source.
 
First, I can assure you that the federal government doesn't invest in roads in Texas. We don't take government money, we have an 80 MPH speed limit and we do just fine.

Maintaining infrastructure isn't a true investment in financial terms. There is no return on that investment.

For example, the federal government "invests" in a federal highway between Seattle, Washington and Atlanta, GA. They fund workers to build this interstate highway. When it's done, what happens to those workers? They're gone. There is no return on that investment that allows government to retain those workers. If they want to keep those workers employed on the next project, they have to confiscate more money from the private sector.

Business doesn't operate that way. Business can realize a return on an investment and grow organically, hiring more workers, based only on commercial success.

This is the part you have to wrap your head around. Its key. Being an employer is not the same as creating jobs. The government can tax the private sector, transfer that wealth to the public coffers and use it to pay for employees, but they've created nothing. What they've done is stopped job creation.

They've taken money from the private sector which could have employed a private sector worker instead of a civil servant. That private sector worker could have helped to increase commercial success leading to the hiring of a second and third worker.

That is the keep difference between investing and spending.
 
According to the link TX took $ 3.2 Billion in federal transportation funds in 2010 and is projected to get the same this year. But, I also wanted to comment, whatever your view of Federal taxes, the same principles should apply to State taxes. So, whether it's Washington or Austin taxing you, the principles are the same.

http://www.lbb.state.tx.us/Federal_Funds/Watch_2011/Federal Funds - 041911.pdf

Your forgetting that businesses will use improved highways and transportation to move their goods to customers. This can result in decreased transportation costs and higher profit for business. That would be one example of a ROI on government spending.

A government worker still buys and spends and has an impact on economy. Think of any business in a military town. Sure, the salary paid to the member is a cost. But, all the restaurants, car dealerships, grocery stores, etc., reap income from the spending of these public sector employees.
 
The over-simplification of an enormous problem doesn't make it easier to understand, just harder to fix.

Asking what happens to people in a public work project after its done is a fair question. Looking back to the Great Depression, I think what happened is that the massive spending that came with WWII engulfed a lot of the workers. Afterwards factories got re-appropriated to other uses. Repurposing existing and unused infrastructure isn't a bad idea though.

As for jobs going overseas, some of that is coming back partially due to the overseas cost going up. Businesses are realizing that the savings isn't worth it anymore because they can spend a bit more and get people in this country to do the same job. It helps the country's economy, gets people answering phones that speak English as their first language, and there's the PR bump of course.

Here's a question: what do you do with a resource that's over-valued?
 
Fred Sherman said:
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The gov't is not spending much on infrastructure. American infrastructure is falling apart from the accumulating deficit of deferred maintenance.
I don't see the corporations volunteering to build the roads. Do you want the corps to build the roads and charge us? How is that different from a tax except there are more executive salaries to pay?
 
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/poli...-private-toll-roads-get-new-push-in-texas.ece

Private toll roads in North Texas have worked out just fine. Of course the Austin Dummycrats objected, bu that hasn't changed our experience in North Texas. And here's the kicker - they get done faster too.

As for Federal spending lowering transportation costs, con side the experience on Boston and the moister cost-overruns of The Big Dig. Add another data point:

Gasoline cost per gallon when Obama took office: $1.832
Average gasoline cost per gallon today: $3.642
Thats a 98% increase in transportation costs that no road is going to fix.

Want to solve unemployment and transportation costs? Build wealth? Increase employment long term?

Drill, baby, drill.

Drill in ANWAR, drill off shore, drill in the US. Finish building the pipeline from Canada to Houston. Thats how government can help, by being less restrictive. This is how you build wealth, grow the GDP, increase the tax base, lower the cost of consumer good and decrease the influence of the middle east not he US economy.

Now, do you expect someone who foolishly gave stimulus money to a dozen failed "green companies" to do this and abandon his tree-hugging political base for the good of the American people?

And speaking of the government's ability to invest stimulus money, how much money did the US tax payer lose in propping up Government Motors? And they call that a success. Why, because for them it is. It doesn't matter how much the taxpayers lost. Union workers kept their jobs so they paid for their votes.
 
jadmperry said:
According to the link TX took $ 3.2 Billion in federal transportation funds in 2010 and is projected to get the same this year. But, I also wanted to comment, whatever your view of Federal taxes, the same principles should apply to State taxes. So, whether it's Washington or Austin taxing you, the principles are the same.

http://www.lbb.state.tx.us/Federal_Funds/Watch_2011/Federal Funds - 041911.pdf

Your forgetting that businesses will use improved highways and transportation to move their goods to customers. This can result in decreased transportation costs and higher profit for business. That would be one example of a ROI on government spending.

A government worker still buys and spends and has an impact on economy. Think of any business in a military town. Sure, the salary paid to the member is a cost. But, all the restaurants, car dealerships, grocery stores, etc., reap income from the spending of these public sector employees.
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You are so right.
  1. Building infrastructure benefits everyone, including businesses, i.e., "the common good."
  2. Businesses reap income from government salaries, i.e., "the multiplying effect."
 
Okay, I give up. I can't convince socialists that socialism is wrong, despite the 80 year history of failure around the world. I'm not going to keep trying. It simply underscores my belief that the demise of the US is an unstoppable, inevitable conclusion. That train can't be stopped. The only question remaining is the time of arrival.
 
Fred Sherman said:
Okay, I give up. I can't convince socialists that socialism is wrong, despite the 80 year history of failure around the world. I'm not going to keep trying. It simply underscores my belief that the demise of the US is an unstoppable, inevitable conclusion. That train can't be stopped. The only question remaining is the time of arrival.
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You know, calling someone a "socialist" with the intent of insult only works in the United States. Just a heads up, try that with someone from Canada, Australia, Germany, China (especially them), etc. They'll either tell you wtf? or laugh at you.
 
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