At the end of the day government workers spending their salaries in the community is helpful but does not come close to the investment, literally putting capital and expertise to work, that the U.S. Sure govertnment funding infrastructure and hwys (but lord not a bullet train) can create jobs, but so can tax and regulatory policy. Let’s see real balance and not just another hand out to governments just before an election dressed up as stimulus.

The only point I’d make is that, when it comes to transportation infrastructure (roads, bridges, tunnels etc.), the private sector does the building, but the money has always come from government. But I do agree there is always risk of waste and abuse. And, you are right, it is hard for some of us to believe the New Deal did not work. It was doing pretty well up until 1937, reducing unemployment from 25% to 15%. Then they got concerned about deficits and put the brakes on. After that, we had to wait for the WW2 stimulus package.

Speaking of waste, I heard Gene Burns on KGO tonight talking about an article in one of the foreign affairs journals, talking about China’s role in the Bay Bridge project. Having China do its part of the bridge work supposedly saved $400 million. Of course, it also screwed our economy out of billions of economic activity and gave it to China instead. Penny wise and pound foolish.

The way to get people back to work is to unleash the spirit of the individual and make government accountable for the money it spends. It does nobody good to borrow money to create a temporary job. Government waste has to be controlled, and job stifling regulations have to be rolled back. I know it is hard to for some to believe, but the New Deal did not work. When the government spends our money , political motivations dictate where and how that money is spent. The vast govt. bureacracy combined with political motives inflate the cost of all public projects and the bang for the buck is gone. Only in the private sector can you get true value and raise revenue. Government is not the way out.

The way to put the people you listed back to work is to get them more customers. If we get a million or so people in good-paying private employer jobs doing infrastructure, they become those customers. My barber’s customers will go back to getting haircuts monthly rather than every other month. Not only that, the spending results in high value public assets that (a) we all use, and (b) we have to invest in now or later anyway. Considering the alternatives, what’s not to like?

RR, not sure I get your thinking. There’s an unprecedented amount of investment capital out there, just not the demand to warrant deploying it. I think the current situation is unfortunately very much like 1933 and 1937. The idea is to kickstart demand. Nobody is talking about having unemployed programmers do roads, bridges, tunnels, pipelines and airports. There are plenty of unemployed civil engineers and workers with the requisite skillsets for that. Put them to work in good private employer jobs, and, with luck, the ripple effect starts to kick in. We’re stuck in the mud now because all those who loaded up on credit card debt and home equity fools gold are trying to unwind debt instead of spending. Like ‘em or not, public sector workers historically have been a stabilizing force in a down economy. Now, with layoffs, furoughs, paycuts and their own debt workout issues, that stabilization isn’t there. Same for people on fixed incomes. Usually consistent spenders no matter what the overall economy looks like. But not now, when they get zero yield on their money. All that on top of the fact that, other than real estate bubble jobs, we haven’t had private sector job growth since 1999, partly due to globalization and the fact that our “information economy” is not as labor intensive as a manufacturing economy. If we can kickstart things, nobody benefits more than businesses. We can “do nothing” and just cut spending. But my prediction is that just guarantees a deep second dip and even bigger deficits, no matter how much we cut. Yes, that’s Keynesian thinking. I’m not feeling much “Austrian” love right now.

He is completely insane. I’m sure he masturbates frantically while posting his insane rants.

You read one, you’ve read them all, by the way. They’re all the same. Anyone who doesn’t subscribe to his unique brand of insanity is a fascist.

Our motto is “E Pluribus Unum” for a reason, you jackboot fascist thug — it’s called U.N.I.T.Y. (as in Common Unity — aka Community).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgXdbtJ13oc

Maybe this short film should be played at a session for all of our politicians.