I've spent a lot of time in my blog posts urging the Obama administration and Congress to take immediate action, from every available direction, to plug the 22 million employee "jobs gap" that is strangling our country today. And you can be sure that everywhere members of Congress went on the campaign trail this summer and will travel to this fall, they are hearing this exact same thing from voters. Luckily for Members in races this year, there are still five weeks remaining until the mid-term elections to talk with voters about job creation. For the nation, however, there are only a limited number of days left in this Session of Congress -- less than thirty days for sure, even assuming a lame-duck session - to see some quick actions taken.
Unfortunately, two big issues -- energy and immigration -- which are key to the future of the U.S. economy and our prospects for significant job creation will not be addressed at all in what remains of this Session, and, in all encompassing ways, maybe not even in the next Session. However, pieces of each could be legislated early next year which would quickly create some of those jobs we're missing. And let's be clear, the future of the U.S. economy and our prospects for significant job creation will be hugely impacted by how we eventually manage these two issues.
As soon as possible next year, Congress should at least seek to agree on a renewable energy standard for the country that would require utilities to provide escalating amounts of power from renewable sources like wind and solar energy. And then it should tackle the promotion of home-efficiency retrofits, high-efficiency home appliances, natural gas-powered commercial trucks, and medium-cost electric vehicles, which would have significant job-creating effects.
Regarding immigration, also early next year there are important hearings that should be held. In them, Congress needs to remind the American people and workers that most of the 11 million-plus unauthorized immigrants have been resident here for many years with the active encouragement of our federal and state governments and the business community, mostly doing jobs that businesses wanted to under-pay for. They have worked hard for years, and now they're entitled to both pathways to legalization and a temporary worker program.
Unauthorized immigration is not at all the culprit behind either the broad-based erosion of the American Dream or the current jobs crisis that many contend. Rather, it's factors like declining unionization, the erosion of the real value of the minimum wage and wages in general for 90% of workers, and our grossly unbalanced foreign trade.
The one area therefore where meaningful action still can and should be taken by Congress in the relatively few days remaining is trade reform, where at least three quick steps should be taken.
Right now, around 40% of U.S. exports are to countries with which we have bilateral trade agreements, which we often fail to fully enforce, and many of them are out of touch with today's global economy and where the U.S. stands in it. The other 60% of our exports are to markets with trade barriers, which need to be broken down in order to provide American manufacturers with level global playing fields. And while President Obama is rightly proud of recent increases in U.S. exports, the White House continues to largely ignore the U.S. trade deficit which is skyrocketing and crushing both our economy and millions of our workers.
The Obama administration is abdicating on trade generally and, in the extreme, it is tolerating China's trade abuses, proudly settling for China's recent opening of its market to "American pork and pork products" (and little else), and endlessly studying -- rather than acting upon -- the fundamental economic rebalancing that must take place among the world's major trading partners. Imports from China alone are now responsible for about 75% of our deficit in manufactured goods and 55% of our overall trade deficit.
Those three quick-hit trade initiatives that Congress should quickly undertake before the end of the year are:
1. Hold hearings on the strategic and economic differences between a manufacturing and industrial strategy and a policy, and between the administration's goal of "doubling (gross) exports over five years" and, instead, "increasing net exports," which would create millions more jobs. Every other major developed nation plus China and India has a "manufacturing and industrial policy." Unfortunately, the administration says that we need only a "manufacturing strategy", which conveys an unwillingness to engage with the private sector at exactly the time in history when we need to do so the most and which won't revitalize our diminished manufacturing sector or close our oppressive trade gap.
2. Take up and then vote down the President's three pending free trade agreements (FTAs) with South Korea, Colombia and Panama. These three agreements will destroy many more American jobs than they will ever create. First negotiated under Bush but now embraced by Obama simply, it seems, for the sake of showing momentum, these three FTAs would allow, in the same way that NAFTA did, for massive imports into the U.S. with few opportunities for reciprocal exports of U.S. products. These agreements are particularly flawed in the areas of U.S. beef and agricultural exports and automotive and industrial textile imports into the U.S. They are more broadly flawed in their failure to account for the relative advantages afforded the three proposed trading partners by their value-added tax systems. FTAs must apply the same rules to both parties and to accept agreements that impose nonreciprocal tariff and tariff-elimination schedules violates the most basic concepts of free trade, which are fairness and balance.
3. Hold hearings regarding trade enforcement, which I am convinced will show that right now we do not either enforce our trade agreements very well or protect our domestic manufacturers, especially their hard-gained intellectual property. U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk has said that, "There's a danger in which we believe the only way to get new market growth is just to go get new trade agreements." To his credit he has suggested a strategy that focuses less on bilateral deals and more on boosting exports through promotion and 'more rigorous enforcement of trade rules'. Yet he has received almost no encouragement from the White House on this approach, even after showing that just for our software and high-technology sectors, compliance with World Trade Organization rules on intellectual property rights by China and Southeast Asian nations would boost annual U.S. exports by $50 to $75 billion. In these hearings, Congress should also look at moving trade enforcement to a fully enabled and funded office in the Justice Department. Trade negotiation and the enforcement of agreements are distinct activities requiring very different skills, and enforcement best belongs with 'enforcers', not with those who negotiated the trade agreements.
We all know that Congress failed to pass a meaningful jobs bill because of Republican resistance. As Ezra Klein said, "Republicans managed to take a jobs bill, weaken it to an unemployment benefits and state and local relief bill, weaken that to an unemployment benefits bill, and then weaken that bill." As a consequence, the 30 million real unemployed workers have been left only with a series of palliative benefit extensions, which is hardly a valid mechanism for creating the millions of jobs destroyed by the Great Recession of 2007 and for attacking the record-level income inequality that has left 90% of American workers with stagnant wages for nearly two decades.
Members of Congress have their work cut out for them. With the White House seemingly devoted to other issues, Congress needs to act yet this year on any areas it can which can yet chip away at the continuing absence of that much needed jobs bill. Let's start with trade where Congress should take its oversight responsibilities seriously and begin to redirect the administration's approach toward fair free trade.
Let's also, through this piece and in others to follow, start telling U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke that henceforth whenever they meet on global trade and investment issues, the trade principles outlined above should be paramount. The Global Services Trade Summit begins in DC tomorrow, and in addition to Ambassador Kirk and Secretary Locke, attendees will include Anand Sharma, Minister of Commerce, India; Bruno Ferrari, Secretary of the Economy, Mexico; Pascal Lamy, Director-General, World Trade Organization; and trade ministers from around the world. They should all hear that from within the U.S. Congress, there are soon to be some 'new sheriffs in town' when it comes to U.S. trade.
Leo Hindery, Jr. is Chairman of the US Economy/Smart Globalization Initiative at the New America Foundation and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Currently an investor in media companies, he is the former CEO of Tele-Communications, Inc. (TCI), Liberty Media and their successor AT&T Broadband. He also serves on the Board of the Huffington Post Investigative Fund.
Electricity from wind and solar costs 50 cents per KWH to produce, while coal and nuclear costs 5 cents per KWH to produce. Sorry but I don't feel like paying 10 times as much for my electric bills.
Nuclear and Hydro are the only real cost efficient answers, if you want to electricity to be produced from anything other than fossil fuels.
Plus those types of energy would produce real jobs in the United States, rather than in China.
Our esteemed leadership in Washington just spent 300 million on a plant that employs 90 people (over 3 million per job) to produce batteries that cost thirty thousand dollars.
If that's our new energy strategy we're doomed.
Most of the exports from China are complementary, and not competitive, with what is made in the U.S. Good prices continue to keep consumer prices low. Instead of protectionist moves, Washington should instead push for increasing exports, by (a) revamp export controls; and (b) encourage FDI into America's export sectors. Who better to sell and export Made in America, than folks who know the language and custom and needs and wants of the target markets, such as traders FROM the target markets?
Solar is best installed on homes and businesses where it is used, not in some field the utility has to buy or lease, then build infrastructure to transmit the power.
Since private solar competes with peak retail rates, instead of the cost to the utility, lower subsidies are needed for a private owner to break-even. More solar installed for the same tax dollars. Other countries are already emphasizing private ownership of solar over utility fields.
Reduce the monopolistic power utilities have over us. Power to the People.
The utilities are paying only around 18 cents/kwh on 20 year PPAs. Even with the fancy and complicated TOU amplication, it only goes up to a theoretical 22 cents. Assuming that the equity investor wants a 10% return, that only "capitalizes" you up to $2.20/Wp. Even if you assume that you are going to still get the 30% tax credit, that grosses it up to around $4.00/Wp. WHERE IS THE PROFIT for the panel makers and EPC contractors?
Unless there is a way to do this calculation on a massive scale using RETAIL rates, solar PV still is going to just crawl along.
You are partially right about energy but you seem to forget that Obama shut down the offshore oilfields in the US even though he lifted the moratorium on shallow water drilling the MMS is NOT handing out new permits. This new measure he introduced to permanently seal 3500 oil wells in the US is crazy. Working in the oil field for 30 years kind of makes me an expert, this is how it works all those wells are not producing enough volume at the current oil prices to make them profitable. Small companies such as ERT, Enterprise and Forrest Oil buy these wells and produce from them since they are small companies they have a lower overhead. Exxon and BP can take their ball and go anywhere in the world but the small guys can’t while all our jobs are going overseas because of Obama and out trade deficit climbs because of imported oil. While Obama shuts the Gulf down he is loaning money to Brazil and Mexico to drill go figure.
In the 70s they told us we had to drill in Alaska to reduce our future dependence on foreign oil, but the opposite was true. If we hadn't drilled we would have that oil now, and be in much better shape. Same with the Gulf: better off if we'd never drilled. "You can't eat your cake, and have it too".
All drilling increases our future reliance on foreign oil.
If we were smart, we would import all our oil, save what we have for 10 years from now when the price is $200 a barrel. Which T Boone Pickens says it will be, and with all due respect, he knows oil better than you.
Besides this article was about jobs and the trade deficit all goods coming from other countries total are not as high as out trade deficit on oil. Don’t forget that silly JOB loose thing either. We should be using EVERY means at our disposal for energy independence now.
So you want $200 a barrel oil $15 for a gallon of milk $10 a gallon gas $7 for a loaf of bread? Be careful what you wish for you just might get it and sooner then you think.
fanned & faved
It is only a completely out of touch political machine that could belive for one second that waving 12 million illegals into the country didn't hurt employment prospects for citizens. It's just crazy, nonsense and no matter how they try to spin it for their own self serving political gains it's simply isn't true and they might just as well stop trying to convince the citizens of thsi country that it is.
In my town the college kids and high school kids had no where to go to earn money, the illegals here have taken all the jobs that youngsters used to do to learn about workign a job and earning a job. The illegals are busing tables, cutting lawns, workign the fast food chains, working the horse training centers which used to draw teenages for work by the hundreds. The list goes on and on. All the low paying jobs that young Americans used to be able to count on to get started with job experience are gone. And this has put enormous pressure right on up the chain to bring wages down. It's positively criminal that the Fed government would do next to nothing to stop this and in Obama's case many sneaky things to encourage it.
There will be no renegotiating of "free" trade agreements as long as Democrats and Republicans, aka the Property Party, are in power.
Sorry, but Obama has little or no interest in dealing with any of this - he has little interest in Americans and America - his eyes are on a world platform where he pushes George Soros ideas of simply knocking the American people down to third world status - we're almost there - and then funneling all taxpayers dolalrs out of this country into "buying" smaller, poorer, corrupted governments around the globe.
This is why Obama gives lip service to "securing" our southern border while actually working diligently to flood the country with illegals who will become the servant workers and continue to apply pressure on the workforce to lower, lower wages - he has instructed Feds not to prosecute or deport illegals committing crimes unless it is a felony charge, he had Hillary take plans to present to the UN whereby the UN takes over immigration law for our country ( the idea is to strip the states of any power and give orders to FEDs NOT to enforce any immigration laws until it is finally all handed off to the UN).
People better a grip on just what this smooth talking con man is up to - because he is destroying this country .
There is no reason to give a tax break to someone who wants to build a Chinese factory to steal American jobs.
http://www.opic.gov/
OPIC: Overseas Private Investment Corporation
OPIC insures overseas operations of U.S. companies against:
o confiscation
o war
o terrorism
Let's fire all of the teachers, police officers, fire fighters, and other government workers, starting with those in unions.
Who wants a paramedic saving a loved one's life if they're in a union ?
Why do kids need much of an education to work at Wal-mart ?
Why can't every city pass a mandatory gun ownership law, like Kennesaw, Georgia ?:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN1719257620070418
Southern U.S. town proud of its mandatory gun law | Reuters
sarcasm offf
Sure, we've heard quite a bit about corporations and rich individuals not paying their share but something is wrong when companies are looking to offshore the headquarters work to a small economy like Ireland based on tax policy.
Which large American firms have you heard this from?
The answer isn't to lower taxes for these anti-American companies - the answer is to charge them such huge taxes to import to America that America will no longer be a viable market.
All these companies are counting on a big market in America - maybe they'll move offshore and then it will give the incentive to new companies to start up here and sell directly to our large market - with no import taxes or expensive transport costs - the new companies would thrive. Then we would be telling the anti-American off shoring companies to kiss our arse.
We NEED illegal aliens in order to create jobs!?
Yes, I want to hear the explanation of why we need illegal immigrants to create jobs?
harry Reid thought he had a brilliant idea - let young illegal Mexicans get shot up in one of the US's bogus wars -for-profit - and if they survice they on their way to citizenship. He called it the "Dream Act" , a nifty military recruitment idea - I guess our governmnet is running out of legal citizens volunteering to serve in their useless, unwinnable, desesrt wasteland wars....
But a restating of that position. As for the military being a route to citizenship, such is already the case for legal aliens! But to extend that to illegals is a very bad idea.
How many "bogus wars -for-profit" have there been. How do you know your number is correct?
Don't just parrot somebody. Have reasons for what you say.
One Month Of Trade-Related Carnage: All The Trade Adjustment Assistance Certifications Issued By The Department of Labor During The Month Of August, 2010
"August 2, 2010
-- Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Maine, S. Portland, Maine. Health insurance and related services including finance and provider operations were sent offshore.
-- Citicorp Credit Services' Risk and Fraud Operations Division, Tucson, Ariz. Employees doing risk and fraud operations support services lost their jobs to outsourced foreign contractors.
-- Fairchild Semiconductor, Mountaintop, Penn. Production of discrete power semiconductors has shifted to a foreign country.
-- Precision Dynamics Corp., San Fernando, Calif. The company shifted production of identification wristbands and labels used in the entertainment industry and hospital facilities to a foreign country.
-- Precision Wire Components,Tualatin, Ore. Production of the company's precision medical device components was sent offshore.
-- River Bend Industries, LLC Fort Smith, Ark. Workers making plastic parts lost their jobs because the appliance company buying River Bend's products shifted its production offshore. .."
These are the results of actions by governments such as the one making the following proposal; "The West Virginia Department of Transportation is floating the idea of charging an additional tax on food purchased at drive-throughs. The idea was discussed Monday at a meeting of state legislators.
It would be an extra 5 percent, added to the 6 percent customers already pay. It could bring in tens of millions of dollars for roads, according to official estimates."
If they pass this I will be surprised if they make as much as a dollar. Would you pay such a tax??
In that same period, 1,118,308 workers were certified as being eligible for Trade Adjustment Assistance. That's 0.56% of the total job losses in that period.
Don't you think you would be better off worrying about what's behind the other 99.44% of job losses?
That's
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/06/03/95305/crush-of-new-claims-for-jobless.html
Crush of new claims for jobless program creates bottleneck | McClatchy
"Some people missed out on the health care tax credit because their coverage had already lapsed" by the time their applications were approved, McHugh said. "Or workers had scattered and couldn't be found. And some people had made other arrangements or accepted a bad job," without the benefit of TAA-funded career training, which provides cash support for up to 30 months for full-time students.
"A lot of people had turned the page and moved on, so they weren't able to take advantage of what they would have if their (program approval) had come in a more timely fashion," McHugh said..."
We need a Department of Unemployment to aid in the Main Street depression the U.S. is in.
Except this is raw data of all job changes. Anyone who quit their current job for a better job added a 1 to the job loss and 1 to job gain. Even though seasonally adjusted, it also includes seasonal jobs where each seasonal job adds 1 to loss and 1 to gain every year.
There are 130 million active jobs...all that stat shows is volatility or signs of job change frequency, blurred by a large amount of seasonal jobs.
The best rough estimate you could get is comparing yearly loss vs gains, and 2002 - 2008 was all net gains in jobs. But since a single person be counted multiple times (changing jobs several times a year) and people who commonly quit at end of year and start at first of year, even the net gains are very skewed numbers.
When times are good, job losses and gains go up. Check out the late 90s. People were changing jobs frequently finding new and better opportunities. When times are bad, loses and gains go in the opposite directions. That's about all it tells. Nothing there explains the loss or gain.