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One of the reasons the unemployment rate has not been to bad in the last few years is the continued growth in local and state government. Even though the economy is crashing they have been hiring people. They have used a number of accounting tricks and rainy day funds to keep things going. Starting next year this will not be possible.
Expect the local and state governments to start laying off people, lots of them starting next year. This will make the economic recession seem more real as libraries close, police are taken off the beat, social services are cut and less teachers are hired and class size mushrooms.
This will likely put the unemployment rate at 8% or higher and the pain will be felt. Your thoughts?
Instead of our foolish bail out of the men that created this mess we should use deficit supported government employment as the primary economic support to get our society and economy through this mess. Giving money to the gamblers that wasted the money they got through misrepresentation and theft not only sends the message that limitless greed is good but it rewards the criminal transgressors. Another problem with giving money to these people is that they will continue to invest it in money manipulations instead of things that create wealth. If the money is, instead, spent on government workers they will use it to purchase food, clothing (with proper tariffs) and housing made in this country. Eventually this will create the demand that will lead to investment in wealth producing enterprises. Laying off these people is about a dumb a response to an economic crisis as possible. The government (federal, state and local) should be hiring the unemployed to do the things that need doing like painting bridges, repairing roads and water works, and doing the environmental recovery projects that have been ignored over the last forty years.
If we need huge layoffs they shopuld be at the managerial level in the finance businesses. Let those managers learn how to do something productive like work on a county road crew.
Last edited by GregW; 10-06-2008 at 06:55 AM..
Reason: added line of text
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