jobs

Today in Washington White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee argued against efforts to boost the economy, saying that the jobs market "is on a trajectory of improvement." He was probably trying to evoke a reaction using the initials of the President's slogan "Winning The Future." Or possibly the non "reality-based" force-field that the Bush administration had set up around the White House is still turned on.

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When it comes to jobs, sometimes it seems as if the White House is from Mars and the middle class is from Venus. And Republicans act like they're from the Death Star, patrolling the economy in their Imperial Cruisers directing laser blasts at every job initiative they can find.

The resulting political paralysis has left millions of Americans trapped in geographical or demographic pockets of full-blown depression. Unlike Wall Street's America, theirs is a bleak economic landscape from which there seems to be no escape.

The Administration's mishandling of jobs has become a Rorschach test for those who understands that more needs to be done. Is the White House following a misguided political strategy, thinking people want lower deficits more than they want jobs? Has it been "captured" by the conservative thinking of ex-Republican Tim Geithner? Are the President and his advisors too reluctant to propose measures they know will fail in the Republican House because they want success stories?

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Another bad jobless claims report... and this time Washington seems to have finally noticed that there are some unemployed people out here in the sticks. But instead of jobs programs the geniuses are proposing ... what else? ... even more tax cuts. more »

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We have a jobs emergency. We have a stagnant economy. We are falling behind in economic competitiveness. We have developed a terrible concentration of income and wealth. We can address all of these at once.

Robert Kuttner, writing in The Economic Relapse at the American Prospect, more »

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In response to today's terrible jobs report Republicans are demanding that even more government employees, contractors and others lose their jobs. They also demand that even more construction workers and others receiving government contracts lose their jobs, too. They want to do more of what they did in the Bush years, which led to this mess. more »

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Our trade agreements have pitted working people in countries that do not protect rights or people against the working people here who fought to win the protections of democracy. The result has been devastating to our communities, our economy and our democracy. more »

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Polls show that the American Majority is much more concerned about jobs than deficits. So why is DC talking only about deficits instead of jobs, when jobs are the medicine for deficits? And why is DC only talking about budget cuts as a path to fixing the deficits, when the deficits were caused by tax cuts and lack of jobs? In fact most of the “deficit cures” being discussed in DC don’t make the deficit better, they make deficits worse because they kill jobs.

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Last week’s special election in New York’s 26th Congressional district was a political earthquake, demonstrating that the American majority, even in the most Republican of districts, will reject a candidate who embraces cuts to Medicare benefits or major changes to that most popular program. more »

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The Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO promised a big infrastructure push. The Chamber has backed off. Democrats and President Obama should embrace a big investment in jobs – and challenge the Republicans to support it. The American Majority wants it. It is a winning campaign issue.

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You hear it again and again, variation after variation on a core message: if you tax rich people it kills jobs. You hear about "job-killing tax hikes," or that "taxing the rich hurts jobs," "taxes kill jobs," "taxes take money out of the economy, "if you tax the rich they won't be able to provide jobs." ... on and on it goes. So do we really depend on "the rich" to "create" jobs? more »

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