Virginia economy could face big hit with Pentagon budget cuts

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Washington Post

By Rosalind Helderman | August 9, 2010; 2:28 PM ET

An announcement expected this afternoon from Defense Secretary Robert Gates that the Pentagon will shutter the Joint Forces Command in the Norfolk area, and trim the defense contracting force by 10 percent over the next year could rock the Virginia and Washington regional economy.

The AP reports that Gates will announce the cuts as part of a plan to reduce the Pentagon's budget by billions. JFCOM employs 4,900 people, most of them civilians, who earn a combined $200 million a year. One of the Pentagon's 10 combat commands, JFCOM is charged with training military personnel from the different service branches to work together; it controls 1 million square-feet of office space in Norfolk and Suffolk.
....

Meanwhile, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) has scheduled a bipartisan news conference today with U.S. Reps. Randy Forbes (R), Glenn Nye (D), Bobby Scott (D) and Rob Wittman (R) to discuss the announcement.

Read more: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/virginiapolitics/2010/08/virginia_economy_could_face_bi.html

---

This is a blog, but Gates has made the announcement. It is now being reported by many sources.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Gotta look forward...

[Kolesar]

2. ok by me

Abandoned military sites often get redeveloped into "more useful" commercial or residential developments. Don't give up hope!

[bossy22]

8. "more useful"

Turning a location that has decent paying jobs into a retail location that pays minimum wage is always more useful.

I agree with this decision because i think that the pentagon command structure is bloated and needs to be trimmed but i find it "disgusting" that people on this site who champion good paying jobs seem to look the other way when its defense related. One of my great uncles worked on a Grumman manufacturing line out on long island making components for the F-14 fighter; it was good paying and he managed to live a nice lifestyle. When the defense industry started to slow down in the late 80's and grumman started moving its manufacturing away from long island he was laid off. He managed to get a job for the next 6 years at a P.C. richards for less than half of what he was making when he worked for grumman. I guess thats what some here would call "progress"

Despite the "bad press" the defense industry gets it employs the most amount of americans in manufacturing positions (besides the auto industry). Many of the positions pay very well

[Kolesar]

9. "minimum wage"

That is a tremendous assumption on your part

[zipplewrath]

10. I'm more sympathetic than you might imagine

I think you've picked a bad example for this fight. This command structure was "good paying jobs" but it wasn't manufacturing or any such thing. It was the worst kind of federal/DoD contracting.

I know what you mean about Grumman, they were heavy manufacturing jobs, high precision, highly skilled labor kind of jobs our economy needed, and still does. But none the less, you can't have government military contracting jobs, just for a jobs program. Better to spend that money making fire trucks than fighters. If we need fighters, fine. I do wish that the military contractors tended to have better commercial "arms" or divisions. You get more technology transfers that way, from military to the commercial sector. It can also help control military costs as well. One of the (many) problems we have in military contracting is that it is "isolated" from the rest of the economy in many ways, and the investment we make there doesn't pan out into the larger economic environment very well. NASA was much better at it in it's day. Their spending often had a multiplier effect, generating more economic activity than they spent. An awful lot of military contracting can't make the same claim.

[bossy22]

17. I agree that the command structure needs to be cut

thats why i agree with these cuts; especially that alot of that money may actually wind up in the navy shipbuilding budget (which is woe-fully underfunded).

Maybe this downturn may do what you just said (about contractors creating commercial division). this may have the added effect of producing commercial goods that have a military application- making military acquisitions cheaper. I have always been a big supporter of using "mature designs" rather than the "gold plated- all in one" platform. That was the problem with the rumsfeld DOD. Yes, it was good that the military was getting more funding; but it was spent on equipment that was "gold plated" and cost way too much. the example is best shown in shipbuilding, where money was poured into such things and the DDG-1000 and the LCS; instead of looking at an updated version of the current destroyer (DDG-51) and a coast guard designed cutter as a new frigate. Both platforms were extremely capable; and probably the best in the world in their respective classes (not to mention alot cheaper).

[doc03]

11. There you go "the military industrial complex" that Ike warned

about. Every time you try and cut the Pentagon's budget up pops people bitching about the jobs. So what should they do instead cut SS and Medicare?

[defendandprotect]

39. And, if we cut crime . . . there go jobs!! It's insane that anyone thinks that way!!!

[izquierdista]

12. So does "whore"

It would be nice if there was a seamless transition from jobs of destruction to jobs of construction, but there are no guarantees in life. Maybe you should go re-read what Ike had to say: "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, represents, in the final analysis, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children."

It's time to stop stealing from the hungry and unclothed.

[w4rma]

16. defense related doesn't usually produce anything useful to anyone on the planet.

Good for pillaging the spoils of others, though.

The financial industry is another industry that needs a haircut.

[Recursion]

21. The Internet. Microwave ovens. Antisceptics. Helicopters. Velcro. Arterial ligatures.

UNIX. Modern cryptography. Rocketry. The submarine. The digital computer. GPS (and the entire Greenwich navigation system). Should I keep going?

[boppers]

28. You sure you want to play this?

The Internet. -I'll give you that one.
Microwave ovens. -Raytheon, a private company.
Antisceptics. -That's a pretty big field, dating back to the ancient greeks, but popularized by a medic to the Brititsh royal family. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Lister,_1st_Baron_Lister
Helicopters. -Many original sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter
Velcro. -Private citizen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_de_Mestral
Arterial ligatures. No Idea what this is, actually.
UNIX. -Phone company.
Modern cryptography. -The military copies a lot of privately built work, and does some of their own work.
Rocketry. -Chinese in origin, for parties and festivals
The submarine. -Similar to helicopters, above http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_submarines
The digital computer. -Phone company, again. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Stibitz
GPS (and the entire Greenwich navigation system) -I'll give you this one, too.

For bang for the buck, it looks like we'd get a lot out of spending more money on the phone company.

edit:typo

[No Elephants]

31. We need to re-direct jobs from "defense" to things like re-building our infrastructure, mass transit

and other more constructive projects that we need desperately.

I am sorry about your family member, but he seems to have been a victim of his employer moving elsewhere. I am not sure the move was motivated by a cut in defense spending. Lots of shops that had nothing to do with defense spending (or any kind of government spending) moved during that same time period, many to "right to work" states, for cheaper labor.

[defendandprotect]

40. Exactly . . . look at the long trail of destruction MIC has left everywhere ....

decades of money going to MIC rather than needed programs --

[villager]

3. What's that you say? A "red" state living off the public teat!?

n/t

[Recursion]

14. NoVa is about as blue as a region gets outside of the northeast

The red parts of the state won't feel much of anything if all of NoVa's jobs disappeared, except maybe the gas station owners along 66 and 81.

[villager]

26. State revenues? Taxes? (Not that the current gov/A.G. there uses a word like "tax")

Might the loss of largesse have .....reverberations?

[TheCowsCameHome]

4. Gravy train finally derailed?

Whoda thunk it............

[The_Casual_Observer]

5. It's 1000's of people doing essentially nothing & getting paid well for it.

The Norfolk area could never survive without military life support spending.

[Recursion]

15. Hey... I'm a Navy contractor and I bust my ass

Yeah, there's a whole lot of waste and fraud, but there's also some of the few remaining stable, good-paying jobs.

[bossy22]

18. exactly

its a good thing that the news is that a good portion of this savings is going to be put back into programs such as navy shipbuilding. thats why "accross the board" defense cuts are always stupid; because some areas need more money, and some can do with less. I'm a fan of Gates's cost cutting and efficiency plans. Hopefully he can attain the savings he is lookin for and roll them back into the base budget and add them to needed areas.

[Recursion]

20. And I think people have no sense of the time scale here

A major system like a carrier or frigate has something like a 30-year acquisition lifecycle. There will be people whose entire career is that one ship. And most of that money was allocated a long time ago, so a lot of the big ticket items can't really present any savings.

[doc03]

22. Cut pork but don't you dare touch mine, what is your

solution cut the budget on the backs of SS and Medicare recipients? How will we ever get government under control when no matter what you do some special interest whines about it. Do you have any clue how many jobs and how many sacrifices people in private industry have taken over the last several decades while military contractors rape our country on $3000 toilet seats?

[Recursion]

30. There's no need to "get government under control"

We need more federal spending, not less.

[No Elephants]

32. Don't know if we need more federal spending. We sure need smarter federal spending.

[Recursion]

33. Sorry, we need more *actual* spending

And less throwing money at large corporations who then don't spend it, but rather keep it.

[defendandprotect]

41. As Ike made clear, nothing constructive comes from weapons... bombs...MIC...

we can create new jobs just cleaning up the destruction of the MIC --

in fact, all over the world!!

Let's find something positive and constructive to do with our money -- the MIC isn't it!!

[underpants]

23. Uncle Sucker

that's what the contractors at one major Hampton Roads base referred to the government


People in Va (many parts) live in a delusion about exactly how much they live off the tax payer teet.

[Roland99]

6. That's only about a $41,000/yr salary. Ain't a lotta money for that part of the country.

[Abq_Sarah]

29. Does unemployment pay more?

[defendandprotect]

42. Unemployed workers are less destructive than MIC workers -- and weapons making!!!

[Bitwit1234]

7. Oh oh oh McDonnell has scheduled a bipartisian news conference

what does he need the Democrats for. Must be really something for him to lower himself to even come near them.

The only time a republican will associate with a Democrat is if they are begging for something from the government, which they 'say' they don't approve of, want nothing to do with, but suck up to them all the time.

[Blue_Tires]

44. exactly...

[defendandprotect]

13. Bush DOUBLED our costs for MIC .... we have a Taj Mahal of a US Embassy in Iraq . . .

troops all over the world -- plus 20 new permanent military bases in Iraq!!

This expansion of military in states/communities is also unhealthy for the nation and

democracy!!

Boo hoo -- start dismantling this whole BS thing --

[avaistheone1]

35. Yes, it is a Tah Mahal of destruction.

[Imajika]

19. This won't play well in Northern VA

It is going to make re-election for Democrats like Gerry Connolly much trickier. Probably most Democrats in Virginia will be forced to oppose this.

Very well might be a good idea to make these cuts and reductions, but its definitely throwing a stink bomb in the Democratic camp just in time for November.

[defendandprotect]

36. If American public has any working brain cells, it's halve MIC or face the catastrophe violence

will bring us to --

But . . . interesting as to WHY Obama and GATES decided to announce this right now --

pre-election???

I think every Democrat needs to set their BS meter much higher!!

[msongs]

24. there are NO BUDGET cuts, any money saved will be kept and spent on something else - liars again nt

[depakid]

27. Shipbuilding in Newport News (Northrop) stands to gain

[defendandprotect]

37. We should be using the money for GREEN jobs to clean up MIC pollution . . ....

Look what they've left in the wake all over the world!!

And what they've done to our own Vets -- !!

[Earth_First]

25. More election year grandstanding...

The GOP knows that they do not have their GOP minions in a row yet for the ballot box so they are going to hit them where they believe their values lie the deepest: military/defense spending and xenophobia.

Step 2: Blame the Democrats and accuse them as being soft on national defense.

[No Elephants]

34. The last two Democratic Presidents reinforced that stereotype by appointing Republicans as "Defense"

Secretaries.

Speaking of which, we should give that position back its old name: Secretary of War. It's much more accurate than "Defense."

[defendandprotect]

38. Right ... a Democrat can't be trusted to head up Defense!! Outrageous!!

[mike r]

43. But don't we need a million more Top Secret Americans to keep track of

the ~100 Al Qaeda cave dwellers in Afghanistan?

[Blue_Tires]

45. the funny thing is here locally we've had our own Tea Party for years

before there was a name for them...

Now all the usual suspects are going to grovel before the evul, socialist president they have sworn to hate, and beg for some Big Gummitt solution keeping the Commonwealth's place on the gravy train...