Senior Chris Carey
Most Americans would agree that some form of job creation should be involved in any plan to fix the economy. The question is, what kind of jobs should we create and how should we create them? I am of the opinion that the current plan to create jobs and stimulate our economy is more of the same failing policies from Washington.
It was almost as if I was hearing a broken record when Obama announced his “new” jobs plan a few weeks ago. Payroll tax extensions, infrastructure projects, and short-term jobs…where had I heard this before? Then it hit me, the stimulus package.
More priming and pumping and more jumpstarting growth. Some may say that this strategy works, and has worked in the past. But, statistics tell another story. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, unemployment levels were around 8.2% when Obama’s original stimulus package was passed. Currently, the unemployment rate is around 9.1%, higher than when the stimulus package was passed. And although the stimulus package created an estimated two million jobs, most of them were short term and did not facilitate sustainable job growth. For example, take a basic infrastructure project like building a bridge.
This project requires the government to hire architects and construction workers. In the short term, this project would create jobs and provide an immediate income to hundreds of families. But what happens when the bridge is built? The workers are out of a job and we are back to square one. Some might argue that workers are more likely to be hired after working on government projects. But if this argument was true, why haven’t unemployment rates continued to decline? Why haven’t companies started hiring workers? The answer to both of these questions is simple: short term job creation doesn’t work.
Fortunately for Americans, there is hope. The American Jobs Act does include tax breaks for small businesses; encouraging companies to hire workers and get Americans back to work. More positive incentives such as these are just what Americans need to get our economy going again. But, unfortunately for Americans, the American Jobs Act takes the wrong approach to economic recovery through failed economic policies and short-term job creation.
Junior Helena Buchmann
The American Jobs Bill is the best option for job creation that our government has brought to the table.
The tax breaks for hiring veterans and the long term unemployed create huge incentive for businesses to expand their workforce and to hire people who are having the hardest time finding jobs. A recent study shows that people who have been unemployed for over six months have a drastically lower chance of receiving a job than those who have been unemployed for a shorter period of time.
It also gives incentive to raise wages of current employees with the lowering of the payroll tax, which will help stimulate spending. The only thing that seems unclear about the payroll tax cut is that it only goes to the first 160 million and its not said how they determine who gets it.
The big thing for me is that it really promotes growth and infrastructure. President Obama stressed in his speech the lack of technological progress the united states has compared to countries like china. Obama wants to do what Dwight Eisenhower did. Under Eisenhower, thousands of people became employed when he made the interstate highway system. Obama is attempting to do his own, modern version of this. If successful, construction workers, engineers, project managers, and countless others will reap the benefits.
Many people say this plan does not create long term jobs. But does a construction worker ever really have a long term job? In most cases, projects are completed. However, I see a way for long term jobs to trickle out of this. Let’s say we improve our highway system here in Kansas City and finally introduce efficient public transportation. Repairing the roads and designing, mapping, planning, and building the transportation will create tons of local jobs. More can come of it than just that. We are the center of the country and of the intersection of I-35 and I-70. This makes us attractive for companies searching for somewhere to set up base, and when they do, they will need people to work for them.
Who knows if we’ll ever even be able to see what could come of this. Republicans, even though they have supported and even suggested some of the ideas in the bill, shot it down. Democrats looking for a few votes in their upcoming reelections voted against it to maintain popularity. The bill could probably stand a few minor adjustments, but at this point it’s really better than nothing. If only the people in Capitol Hill would realize that.
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