Is It Time For Another WPA? Why Government-Created Jobs Aren't The Answer

The New Republic:

Putting aside the standard concern about central planning, there are some unintended consequences that could come with a modern WPA. This 1990 paper by Robert Margo points out that the long-term unemployed with Depression-era WPA jobs were more likely to be unskilled, and when economic conditions picked up, were less likely to get back into the private sector:

Read the whole story: The New Republic

Comments

[trishinpitt]

we have companies who employ white collar employees sending their jobs overseas... this isn't just about unskilled jobs that no one will want to do... this is about career type jobs that we spend a fortune going to college to prepare for leaving this country and not coming back.....

We need to have a few good companies step up and show that they are patriotic and America-first and stop sending jobs out of the country that can be done here.

all government contracts should require that anyone who works on the contract, should be physically in the US and no exceptions.... there should be no government work being done by people in other countries. It should be a matter of national security. If taxpayer bucks pay for, taxpayers should be the people doing the work. it should be required that all employees on those contracts prove they are legally allowed to work in this country. We should make sure that no foreign contractors are brought in if there are Americans willing to do the work. As a programmer for years, I've seen a lot of jobs go to foreign contractors under the guise that no one here wants to do the work... and that's horsesh!t....

If it's an airplane, a truck, a motor, a bullet, a screwdriver, a pencil, and it's being used for government work or defense, it should be made in the USA.... period.....

[totaldisbelief]

Why are we wasting money "nation building" around the world (where the inhabitants don't want their nation built in our image) while Our Nation crumbles from inside?....where are our priorities, with our Country or with Global Corporations?

[Mnemanth]

Thank you.

[totaldisbelief]

? green energy projects? high speed rail? more and better highways? local infrastructure improvement? local rural clinics?toxic clean-up?elderly housing and care?...it's not like there's nothing that needs doing....and they all need different skills and abilities.

[Mnemanth]

Thank you, too!

[ILibertine]

An opportunity is being missed, I think; and the author of this article makes some assumptions that cloud the issue. Why does a WPA (or some other moniker for a gov't jobs endeavor) have to be "unskilled"? Is there not an opportunity to address some fundamental issues of long-term growth, that seems to have largely evaded the perspective of the stock market and businesses focused upon the short-term?

Jobs are obviously needed, and assistance in providing them. Through either a government sponsored program or government aided creation of job openings, or both, it seems a perfect time to invest in areas such as alternative energy, infrastructure and education with the intent of providing skills in the process. The endeavor does not have to, nor ought it imply unskilled.

[oath of fealty]

Stock market surging while main street keeps getting squeezed

good articles: http://financeopinionss.blogspot.com

It looks like 9-8% unemployment is the new normal since the govt. wants ppl to be unemployed. Otherwise we would have REAL shovel ready projects and green jobs instead of the BS we have now.

[LeeCalif]

You're being too clinical. Families need to eat.

When things get back on track. Offer schooling for private sector positions.

WPA is necessary NOW .

[DuganS1]

The WPA hired workers only part time (maximum of 30 hours per week), for a maximum of 12 months, and workers were supposed to be looking for real work the entire time they were with the WPA. Most WPA work was also entirely unproductive for the economy, like raking leaves, digging ditches, building poorly constructed dirt roads, planting trees, or building parks. It wouldn't make sense to have WPA type workers do real work projects. It would be 100x easier and more efficient to have private companies do the projects and hire the workers. Then you'd make sure the workers were actually working and doing a decent jobs. The private companies would also be accountable for their work, plus they would have a far easier time finding workers, and would not hire ineffective or completely incapable workers like the govt would.

[Democratt]

This more than anything else is why I don't trust Obama anymore.

The moment it became clear he wasn't going to fight to actually clean up the financial industry is the moment it became clear that the hope and change rhetoric was just that, rhetoric. All he cares about is keeping corporate money in dem hands, he doesn't dare anger his corporate sponsors.

good articles 4 slow news day: http://financeopinionss.blogspot.com

the system needs to be overhauled cuz nothing seems to change .

[totaldisbelief]

sadly I agree with you...biz as usual.

[RSKaz]

Without question, the time has come again in US economic history where the WPA and CCC should be revisited. We have the need, the workforce, and an unlimited amount of projects. The problem remains whether the GOP will once again sit on its collective hands to deny Americans (of all parties) meaningful jobs, thus perpetuating this nation's further decline. Or finally roll up their sleeves to rebuild the country to which they pledge allegiance. Even if they don't know the words.

[slowhand0728]

Sure why not lets just keep printing money.

[RSKaz]

Bush's "tax break & spend nothing" policies certainly didn't work.

[Troubledwawa]

A very lame article that seems to centralize on the point that people in certain states who worked for the WPA were unskilled, and "were less responsive to improved economic conditions". (IE, they didn't want to go find a private sector job).

Yeah right. The fact that the author overlooks is many roads were built, the National Parks were worked on, dams were built, government buildings were built, etc, etc. These were infrastructure improvements that were key in helping America build a new foundation for a long period of economic growth.

Those "unskilled and lazy" people fell on hard times thanks to wall street. Then worked they're way out of the mess, and helped lay a foundation for the rest of us. Is this the best that they can come up with? A 1990 article with absolutely no data?

[mikefina]

That is NOT what the article said.

People were 'less responsive to improved economic conditions' means that when private sector employment reemerged, unskilled workers were not prepared to fill the jobs. And as the private employment market gained strength, naturally the 'make-work' and infrastructure jobs declined--leaving the unskilled worker without a job to do. ONLY the build-up in industrial production driven by the Second World War was able to mitigate the impacts.

Pay attention.

[texastrixie]

From what I read, we have enough infrastructure diasters waiting to happen to keep an entire generation working through retirement. My husband says he doesn't think anyone would join up for a new WPA, but I think it is worth a try. The WPA jobs would train people to do something. Fix a bridge, build a hospital, rebuild a crumbling school. If we ever actually get out of this "recession," these will be skills that can be transferred. We don't have to pay people a fortune to join a WPA, we pay them slightly better than unemployment. People will take their new skills and bolt as soon as the private sector revives. States will begin to take on renewal projects of their failing bridges, roads, etc. that never made it to the Federal To-Do List.

[bluevase]

It doesn't matter. There aren't going to be any government sponsored work programs.

[texastrixie]

You're right. This is a pipedream.

[ILibertine]

Well, there weren't insofar as the WPA & etc. for over three yrs. after the depression, either, Things got bad. Then they got really bad. Then the electorate became a problem and there was a personality put in place who was equal to the times.

[ILibertine]

Correction: "after the (advent of the) depression"
Secretary on coffee break again.

[FreedomCorpse]

How bout a government that represents the people instead of money, corporations and ignorant economists ideas like Milton Friedman's ideas....that would be a nice change.

[billw8017]

The WPA and CCC paid low wages and more qualified or ambitious workers held out for private employment. The unskilled workers were not the product of these government work programs, but the deliberate beneficiaries. The US programs did protect worker wages whereas, Great Britain let wages fall and had a kind of recovery. Germany, of course, was Nazi. They fixed laborers into a kind of industrial serfdom and enslaved minorities.

The federal work programs did many nice things that were an asset to our quality of life for several decades. The employment kicked in almost immediately in March of 1932 and unemployment was below the level of 1929 when Roosevelt decided to roll them back in 1937.

The US programs paid off during the war with high productivity. Afterwards, wartime savings and the GI Bill educated the returning troops to set up the prosperity that lasted into the Kennedy/Johnson years.

[loki]

The CCC? Your from the midwest arent you.

Without the WPA and the CCC, most of the national park improvements would have never been built. Neither would have some water ways , streets, and other things we just take for granite today. But we never wonder who put all those stones in place, dug out all those ditches, and such. It wasnt the best or the greatest plan, but it was a lot better than what the capitalist were offering. If you were willing to work, you could feed your family and keep what you had. As long as you werent over extended. Which back then not many people were like they are today. If it wasnt for the WPA and CCC, a lot of things would have never happened that we enjoy the use of every single day. Capitalist would have charged to much to ever allow it to happen.

[DuganS1]

Unemployment was never even close to 1929 levels in 1937. It was over twice those levels at the very best in early 1937. And the economy didn't dip back into depression because Roosevelt rolled back fiscal stimulus. It was the huge soldiers bonus checks of 1936 that made the economy go up from then into 1937 in the first place, and the govt can't simply hand out huge stimulus checks every single year, so consumer spending was bound to fall like a house of cards at some point. Second, the drop in govt spending by the federal govt from the end of the soldiers bonus checks was more than made up for with the big increases in local and state govt spending in 1937. The biggest reasons for the 1937-38 depression was the increased taxes via the new payroll tax (social security), the undistributed profits taxes on business (caused corporate investment to drop like a stone), and the big union movement which caused massive strikes throughout the manufacturing economy (can't increase GDP without production, and can't produce when all your workers are outside striking).

[billw8017]

My figures indicate that unemployment had declined to 1929 levels by '36, a reason for Roosevelt's huge electoral college win. I have always assumed that government jobs were counted. Roosevelt did attempt to balance the budget in '37 and unemployment jumped abruptly.

[FoonTheElder]

WPA is a better solution than the proposed tax credit for big corporations for hiring people they would have hired anyway.

It's time to stop the trickle down corporate welfare tax breaks. They only trickle down into China, India and top management bonuses. Giving big corporations money without explicitly requiring it to be used for specific purposes, is nothing more than welfare for the people who need it the least.

[loki]

There are companies that get tax credits for hiring the disable. They hire them for the required period of time at a very low wage. Then they fire them or make conditions so they can no longer do the ever changing requirements of the job, and hire another batch and do it all over again. Tax credits to encourage hiring someone does not work well for anyone but the capitalist bankrolls.

[bbrecht]

Yes to the WPA. Not only did it keep people from starving but the WPA created public projects that we the grandchildren can enjoy and appreciate (our public parks, for example). What are the stimulus packages of today creating for future generations? Nothing but debt, I fear.