That is the title of this ridiculous piece of writing. This has to be one of the worst yet. Perhaps the most insane statement was that saving has no immediate benefit to creating jobs. Incredible.
I wanted to LOL when I read that. You are probably wasting your time on Realclearpolitics.com; it's garbage.
Of course, governments don't create jobs. Nor could they, no matter how hard they tried. This has been evident since at least Bastiat's time. I'm not sure if (or how much) the argument predates one of my favorite political economists. With that said, businesses don't create jobs, either. A business is merely the place where the allocation of economic resources occurs. Government can allocate resources, too, free enterprise just happens to be better at the task.
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David Z
"The issue is always the same, the government or the market. There is no third solution."
I like going there to read the nonsense or "garbage", as you call it, to get a laugh. The economic idiocy over there is amazing, and you get the added benefit of getting it from both sides. That's an interesting point that businesses don't create jobs. I've never thought of it that way.
I used to read Worker's Weekly, for the same reason...
Here's my full reply to that article:
http://nothirdsolution.com/2008/10/17/can-government-create-jobs/
Unfortunately, that's like an hour of my life that I can never get back.
Unfortunately, it appears that this way of thinking is being embraced by my government whole-heartedly:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/oct/20/economy-recession-treasury-energy-housing
They plan on increasing government spending funded by increased public borrowing at a time when public borrowing is at it's highest level since 1946 already and price inflation is at it's highest level for many years.
Either this is going to drive up interest rates (increasing the credit "squeeze") or will drive up prices still further.
Let's give the benefit of the doubt.
Of course governments create jobs. They create government jobs.
And every job governments create sucks away the private capital resources that would have generated "x" number of jobs.
I'll let you guys debate the value of "x". I'm pretty sure it's north of two, and those of you who are economists will even argue it has a decimal point in there somewhere.
Governments do create jobs, in the same manner that serial killers keep unemployment low by reducing the labor pool and increasing the demand for coroners.
"Life is not fair... but we must all proceed with the faith that over the course of all our lives, it will be more or less equally unfair to all of us."
because all unemployment is voluntary in a market economy, government cannot create jobs unless it enslaves the unemployed
...or subsidizes them into workfare which can only work until capital is consumed and overall production declines, reducing the subsidized wages to real wage levels, at which they will refuse to work.
Check my blog, if you're a loser
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