[Peace-discuss] [OccupyCU] Yet Obama refuses a WPA

[C. G. Estabrook]

Jared Bernstein, former chief economist for Vice President Joe Biden, wrote on May 30, 2011, "There will be no WPA-type programs in our near future. There was no appetite for them in the Obama admin in the midst of the worst recession since the Great Depression and there's a lot less now. The reasons for that are interesting and I'll speak to them another day. But it ain't happening" <http://jaredbernsteinblog.com/shoulds-versus-coulds/>.

"...on a WPA program, Bernstein explicitly says it was the White House, not Republicans, who had no appetite for direct, public job creation during the first term. Bernstein says he made the arguments about public works jobs inside the White House, but he was clearly outvoted. He doesn't give the arguments made in response, tantalizingly alluding to 'interesting' reasons that he will 'speak to another day.' But he says very clearly that the reason we did all of this hoops-jumping and nudging in the stimulus package rather than just paying people to work at jobs that needed to be done was a philosophical decision inside the White House. In a sense we already knew this, but it's important that a former White House insider re-emphasized it" <http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/05/30/jared-bernstein-lets-slip-interesting-info-about-wh-economic-views/>.


On Sep 7, 2012, at 8:39 AM, C. G. Estabrook <cge at shout.net> wrote:

> The August jobs report was released this morning at 7:30:
> 
> 	"86,000 fewer Americans have a job today than when Obama took office in January 2009 ... In August alone, another 580,000 people left the workforce entirely ... While the top-line drop of the unemployment rate may seem like a positive [8.2% to 8.1%], it is entirely driven by people leaving the workforce.  In August alone, 119,000 fewer Americans have a job..." <http://getliberty.org/fewer-americans-employed-now-than-when-obama-took-office/>.
> 
> It's the responsibility of government to provide a decent job at a living wage to every American who wants one. But Obama has specifically rejected a New Deal-style Works Progress Administration (even while he adopts the rhetoric of a "New New Deal" - typically "faking left and driving right").
> 
> Obama's 1% sponsors abominate the notion of a WPA for the simple reason that it would raise their labor costs. Fewer people would have to take the terrible jobs and wages that they offer to American workers if those workers could get a decent job at a living wage. 
> 
> It would also move work in America toward production for use rather than production for the profit of the very few. There is immense work to be done that private capital isn't doing - because they can't profit from it - from infrastructure to teaching. A new WPA could remedy that.
> 
> The original WPA even employed artists. 
> 
> 
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