Does Washington care about unemployment?

[SocialistLez]

"A degree of panic would be more appropriate — along with a commitment to use that panic to drive job-creation. The combination of unemployed workers and unmet national needs makes this a uniquely propitious moment for the U.S. government to spend more and tax less. The government’s long-term fiscal imbalances will eventually require us to reverse the mix — to tax more and spend less — so that we arrive at 2020 with a smaller national debt than previously estimated. But that is the wrong policy for today’s emergency.

Still, where is the panic, the sense of urgency? The Obama administration and the Democratic majority in Congress passed a fiscal stimulus plan half the size recommended by Democratic economists fifteen months ago. Since then, they have been unable to assemble a political majority to finish the second half of the job. There seems to be no appetite for addressing ten percent unemployment.

Instead, we have the Obama administration calling for a three-year spending freeze on programs unrelated to national security. We have Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman Chris van Hollen calling for deeper short-term spending cuts. We have an administration experiencing difficulty finding $23 billion to prevent additional teacher layoffs, even though maintaining — no, expanding — investment in education in a recession is the no-brainiest of no-brainers.

Why the enormous disconnect?

Some wise senior Democrats have told me to calm down. The differences between today and 1983 aren’t all that great, they say. Because the Democrats are in power they don’t want to paint a grim picture. Republicans traditionally worry much more about inflation than unemployment; they’re unable even to figure out what policies they want. Moreover, in 1983 it was clear that the monetary and fiscal expansion trains were leaving the station. It was easy for politicians to call for bold and decisive action to fight unemployment, secure in the knowledge that such actions were already in motion and one could soon take credit for them.

But whenever I wander the halls of Washington these days, I can’t help but think that something else is going on—that a deep and wide gulf has grown between the economic hardships of Americans and the seeming incomprehension, or indifference, of courtiers in the imperial city.

Have decades of widening wealth inequality created a chattering class of reporters, pundits and lobbyists who’ve lost their connection to mainstream America? Has the collapse of the union movement removed not only labor’s political muscle but its beating heart from the consciousness of the powerful? Has this recession, which has reduced hiring more than it has increased layoffs, left the kind of people who converse with the powerful in Washington secure in their jobs and thus communicating calm while the unemployed are engulfed in panic? Are we passively watching an unrepresented underclass of the long-term unemployed created before our eyes?

I don’t know. But this unseemly calm does astonish me."


Source:http://theweek.com/bullpen/column/203544/does-washington-care-about-unemployment

[valerief]

1. Just their own, just their own. They want to keep their jobs to serve the wealthy. nt

[flyarm]

2. No, they are too busy Vacationing in Spain and Martha's Vineyard!

[Fire1]

3. Somebody BETTER care and SOON!!!! Have you read

Marx's Manifesto?!! Rhetorical but sincere.:hippie:

[burnsei sensei]

4. The indication is that Washington

does not care about unemployment as an issue, nor do most of them care about the unemployed.

[Burma Jones]

5. I've spent almost my entire adult life living in either the DC area or NYC

and yep, people really don't feel the pain of unemployment, BUT, will shit their pants when the market or the Banks are in trouble.

These folks know that if you farm out your industrial base for thirty years, investors benefit at the expense of the middle and lower classes, but who gives a shit about all those God Fearing Patriots that will cut off their left nuts for some fabled America that never existed?

And, if I see the GOP take over Congress this year, I will give up on those stupid God Fearing Patriots once and for all......

[leeroysphitz]

6. They don't see it as unemployment.

The elites in this country see it as a correction in an over valued labor market.

[SocialistLez]

10. Good observation. NT

[leftofcool]

7. No, they don't

[NC_Nurse]

8. Signs point to NO.

[steve2470]

9. Some do, but not nearly enough nt

[lonestarnot]

11. Depends upon whom in Washington to whom you refer.

[bigwillq]

12. WashingtonTM

doesn't care about anyone but themselves. Always have. Always will. The common folk are just people they use as political pawns.

[blindpig]

13. There are higher priorities...

like coddling the rich.