Discussion on the Job Guarantee Bill

[JP Hochbaum]

For those that don't know, the job guarantee bill is a bill that would guarantee a job for anyone able and willing to do so. It would replace welfare and unemployment. It would work as an automatic stabilizer, rising in scope in recessions and reducing in scope when economies improve. It would also work as a buffer stock in stabilizing prices as well.

This thread will hopefully work as a discussion on its benefits over unemployment insurance and welfare. And also how it works and is applied, many people have asked me about it and where it has been implemented. India, China, Argentina ans the US (from WW2 until the mid 60's) are times and places that practiced full employment policies. But only India (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Gurantee Act) and Argentina (Jefe's Program) have actually passed a job guarantee type bill, but they are only partial and not an actual full employment bill.

How are jobs and work determined? Local communities have input into the selection and design of the jobs and local government plans and implements the work activities. This would also include larger national projects like high speed rail and improving the grid structure. This should help answer ImageP's questions on implementation.

Why do a job guarantee as opposed to unemployment or welfare? For one if you receive cash for free you value it less and waste it more. If you work for it, it is valued more and you make better use of the cash. Also the country benefits more from it because it receives something in return for the cash it dishes out. You are also more inclined to find a better paying private sector job, whereas in unemployment it incentivizes people to wait until the "perfect" offer arises.

My inspiration for this today was a blog by Bill MItchell who has worked with a few countries in implementing a JG: Employment guarantees should be unconditional and demand-driven | Bill Mitchell – billy blog

More links on the JG bill: When is a job guarantee a Job Guarantee? | Bill Mitchell – billy blog (What wages and benefits, training, types of jobs)

 

[ttwtt78640]

The problem I see is INSTEAD of what? Make work jobs are better than welfare but NOT better than actual productive work. Are you suggesting that INSTEAD of paying the current high wages for gov't work that we pay less and let those on the dole take those positions? I doubt it. I feel that what would happen is that a high paid gov't position will be CREATED to over see the "substandard" labor pool put to "work".

Try this instead, no work no food, simply END welfare. That is incentive to get your butt in gear, even if is collecting trash from the roadside for recycling. The nonsense that a job must be GIVEN or CREATED by the gov't is the falacy here. If a task needs doing then let a gov't contract to get it done, the contractor hten NEEDS labor and will hire it, if not then forget it.

"Make work" jobs look productive, yet rarely are. Paying people to do this "busy work", especially those that have no ambition or choice, is NOT going to work out as planned. Try it on a small scale and you soon see reality, the "unskilled" lack more than skill, they lack the ambition to work, as well. You will spend more trying to train and CONSTANTLY supervise these "conscripted" folks than their work output is worth.

I see this constantly with construction laborers and lawn maintanence workers that ARE paid well. These jobs are now taken ONLY until it is found to be HARD WORK for no more than either welfare or a burger flipping job pays, many are now filled by illegal alien labor. Work is out there NOW, plenty of it, but just not EASY work or good paying work.

 

[JP Hochbaum]

The problem I see is INSTEAD of what? Make work jobs are better than welfare but NOT better than actual productive work. Are you suggesting that INSTEAD of paying the current high wages for gov't work that we pay less and let those on the dole take those positions? I feel that what would happen is that a high paid gov't position will be CREATED to over see the "substandard" labor pool put to "work". Try this instead, no work no food. That is incentive to get your butt in gear, even if is collecting trash from the roadside for recycling. The nonsense that a job must be GIVEN or CREATED by the gov't is the falacy here. If a task needs doing then let a contract to get it done, if not then forget it. "Make work" jobs look productive, yet rarely are. Paying people to do this "busy work", especially those that have no ambition or choice, is NOT going to work as planned. Try it on a small scale and you soon see reality, the unskilled lack more than skill, they lack the ambition to work. You will spend MORE trying to train and CONSTANTLY supervise them than their work is worth. I see this constantly with construction labor that IS paid well. These jobs are now taken ONLY until it is found to be HARD WORK for less than either welfare or a burger flipping job pays, many are now filled by illegal alien labor. Work is out there NOW, just not EASY work.

The problem wiht your idea is that there is about 8 unemployed per job opening, and around 16 that are underemployed per job opening. If we simply go the bootstrap approach we will have people starving on the streets and numerous homeless, rising crime, and utter chaos. It simply isn't a good idea.

 

[RGacky3]

Try this instead, no work no food, simply END welfare. That is incentive to get your butt in gear, even if is collecting trash from the roadside for recycling. The nonsense that a job must be GIVEN or CREATED by the gov't is the falacy here.

They tried that before ... People starve, most peopel are not unemployed because they are lazy, its structural problems.

If a task needs doing then let a gov't contract to get it done, the contractor hten NEEDS labor and will hire it, if not then forget it.

Or just use a not for profit government agency, rather than just having corporate welfare.

I see this constantly with construction laborers and lawn maintanence workers that ARE paid well. These jobs are now taken ONLY until it is found to be HARD WORK for no more than either welfare or a burger flipping job pays, many are now filled by illegal alien labor. Work is out there NOW, plenty of it, but just not EASY work or good paying work.

Except that simply not true as JP H said, about 8 unemployed per opening.

Also what happened, did suddenly a bunch of people get lazy since 2007???

Or was it structural institutional problems?

 

[RGacky3]

How are jobs and work determined? Local communities have input into the selection and design of the jobs and local government plans and implements the work activities. This would also include larger national projects like high speed rail and improving the grid structure. This should help answer ImageP's questions on implementation.

Why do a job guarantee as opposed to unemployment or welfare? For one if you receive cash for free you value it less and waste it more. If you work for it, it is valued more and you make better use of the cash. Also the country benefits more from it because it receives something in return for the cash it dishes out. You are also more inclined to find a better paying private sector job, whereas in unemployment it incentivizes people to wait until the "perfect" offer arises.

I think its a great idea, we have a society with tons of public need and tons of excess capacity, but capitalism won't put those together because it doesn't fit the maximising profits maxim.

Also I think if less jobs are needed, rather than having less people work, so some people unemployed and the rest work just as hard, how about everyone works less and get a little more.

There are much better was to run an economy than simply capitalism.

 

[TNAR]

There are much better was to run an economy than simply capitalism.

I could not have said it better myself. "There are much better [ways] to run an economy than simply capitalism."

The key word here is "run". The underlying fallacy egregiously committed by those who propose a government "solution" to such alleged problems as unemployment is the erroneous belief that an economy can be "run". We can see how effective top-down solutions can be for families and businesses and simply make the assumption that the same can be had for nation-states. There are many errors involved in this line of thinking, but I will limit my response to the two most fatal issues.

To begin with, families and businesses, by nature, have the same singular goals. Families [generally] make a concerted effort to live a happy life and rear well-fed and successful children. Businesses exist to produce a good or many goods to consumers. Every piece of the business is crafted in such a way as to adequately satisfy customer demands (with the major exception, of course, of the additional parasitic drain created by regulation). In both cases, all resources and efforts are are directed towards the ultimate satisfaction of their singular (or narrowly defined) goal(s).

States, on the other hand, have an infinite number of goals. As an entity, they must actively pursue or address the needs and desires of an enormously varied population. As such, it is patently impossible to focus the collective efforts of even an infinitely large bureaucracy on the achievement of all goals. To believe that an organization can somehow satisfy the desires of millions of unique individuals through simple manipulation of actions is ludicrous.

The second fatal flaw with "running" an economy has to do with the concept of what an economy even is. Keep in mind that the "economy" is nothing more than a specifically defined (i.e. limited) aggregate of numerous individual transactions. An economy can be defined as being comprised of the transactions of a specific family, a specific business, a specific industry, a specific nation, et cetera. In every case, however, the economy itself is simply the "table of contents", if you will. It is a rough overview of the dozens or millions or more individual transactions.

Suggesting that the economy is "failing" because of certain numbers in the aggregate completely fails to account for the perhaps millions of individuals who are, in fact, succeeding. And on the other hand, claiming the economy is healthy and better than ever completely ignores the perhaps millions of individuals who are or nearly are unable to adequately provide for their basic needs. This shows the simple errors of judgment when dealing with large artificial constructs such as a national economy.

But more importantly, we discover that a combination of these two concepts results in an inability to construct regulation in such a way as to have the desired effect. For example, passing a jobs bill in order to "solve" the "problem" of unemployment will result in the new issue of determining whom can be used for which jobs and how to properly divvy out the work (among many other issues).

Ultimately, a jobs guarantee bill is nothing more than another small step towards a command economy.

 

[JP Hochbaum]

But more importantly, we discover that a combination of these two concepts results in an inability to construct regulation in such a way as to have the desired effect. For example, passing a jobs bill in order to "solve" the "problem" of unemployment will result in the new issue of determining whom can be used for which jobs and how to properly divvy out the work (among many other issues).

Ultimately, a jobs guarantee bill is nothing more than another small step towards a command economy.

The government wouldn't be centrally planned, it would just be partially planned (like it already is now).

The US has had its own success with this in its history. After WW2 there was the Gi bill that gave free education, guaranteed jobs, and subsidized housing for an entire generation. And that entire generation was able to keep the middle class at a level that was historic and only had to be done with one person working. Ever since we abandoned that policy in the late 1960's we have seen an almost complete reversal of that era.

 

[TNAR]

After WW2 there was the Gi bill that gave free education, guaranteed jobs, and subsidized housing for an entire generation. And that entire generation was able to keep the middle class at a level that was historic and only had to be done with one person working. Ever since we abandoned that policy in the late 1960's we have seen an almost complete reversal of that era.

Or... Perhaps precisely because of these subsidies we have seen a "near reversal"? Could it be that college graduates have an enormous difficulty finding ideal jobs in their field because there are so many assistance programs which has flooded the market? Could it be that housing markets crashed because so many people had assistance into a house without the means to maintain it? Perhaps these policies are the reason why the U.S. and its citizenry are in such astronomically high rates of debt?

There is no such thing as a free lunch (or education or anything else you might throw our way).

 

[JP Hochbaum]

Or... Perhaps precisely because of these subsidies we have seen a "near reversal"? Could it be that college graduates have an enormous difficulty finding ideal jobs in their field because there are so many assistance programs which has flooded the market? Could it be that housing markets crashed because so many people had assistance into a house without the means to maintain it? Perhaps these policies are the reason why the U.S. and its citizenry are in such astronomically high rates of debt?

There is no such thing as a free lunch (or education or anything else you might throw our way).

1) I don't support loans for education. I support free education so I agree with you that the current loans structure is harmful.

2) as for housing no one got subsidized housing, or at least those that did, aren't even large enough to be considered a cause of this crash.

 

[RGacky3]

TNAR, economies are run and always have been, now they are run by multi national corporations working within a framework set up by the state.

Businesses exist to produce a good or many goods to consumers. Every piece of the business is crafted in such a way as to adequately satisfy customer demands (with the major exception, of course, of the additional parasitic drain created by regulation). In both cases, all resources and efforts are are directed towards the ultimate satisfaction of their singular (or narrowly defined) goal(s).

No its not, buisinesses exist to make a profit.

Big difference.

Ultimately, a jobs guarantee bill is nothing more than another small step towards a command economy.

I'm not suggesting that at all, I'm suggesting changing the framework.

 

[TNAR]

2) as for housing no one got subsidized housing, or at least those that did, aren't even large enough to be considered a cause of this crash.

How do you figure? There is a whole laundry list of alphabet soup government departments which subsidize the housing market. What portion of all mortgages are covered by Fanny alone?

TNAR, economies are run and always have been, now they are run by multi national corporations working within a framework set up by the state.

I will agree with your statement if you insert the word "attempted". Economies have historically been manipulated with the intent to control, but the effectiveness is marginal at best and wholly circumstantial. If economies could actually be "run" then there would be no depressions, recessions, bubbles, and all of the other results of malinvestment.

No its not, buisinesses exist to make a profit.

Every person and business on the face of the earth has the primary goal of the removal of pain and uneasiness. The exact nature of the opposition to this varies from person to person, but can roughly be equated to the acquisition of money in order to obtain the items necessary for this goal (e.g. food, clothing, housing, etc).

In modern society, nobody is self-sufficient. Short of looting, a person must engage in trade in order to obtain the wealth necessary to survive. With exception to those instances where government forces exchange, all trade is on a completely voluntary basis. Therefore, in order to obtain the profits which you focus so intently upon, businesses and individuals must provide desirable goods to other businesses and individuals. Under economies based on the division of labor, only peaceful and voluntary exchange allow the accumulation of profit (with exception to government coercion, once again).

 

[JP Hochbaum]

How do you figure? There is a whole laundry list of alphabet soup government departments which subsidize the housing market. What portion of all mortgages are covered by Fanny alone?

Being covered by Fannie Mae isn't subsidation

 

[RGacky3]

I will agree with your statement if you insert the word "attempted". Economies have historically been manipulated with the intent to control, but the effectiveness is marginal at best and wholly circumstantial. If economies could actually be "run" then there would be no depressions, recessions, bubbles, and all of the other results of malinvestment.

Of caorse their would be, recessions bubbles and so on make members of the rulling class extremely rich.

Also even though they are run, they are run for short term profits and increasing externalities which end up causing all these problems.

But thats how the economy works within the framework of capitalism we have, I say change the frame work.

Every person and business on the face of the earth has the primary goal of the removal of pain and uneasiness. The exact nature of the opposition to this varies from person to person, but can roughly be equated to the acquisition of money in order to obtain the items necessary for this goal (e.g. food, clothing, housing, etc).

A buisiness isn't a person its a social relation. Profit is the goal of buisiness, but what profit means is wealth extraction, so it ends up profiting by extracting from workers.

A better system would be removal of pain and uneasiness for everyone.

In modern society, nobody is self-sufficient. Short of looting, a person must engage in trade in order to obtain the wealth necessary to survive. With exception to those instances where government forces exchange, all trade is on a completely voluntary basis. Therefore, in order to obtain the profits which you focus so intently upon, businesses and individuals must provide desirable goods to other businesses and individuals. Under economies based on the division of labor, only peaceful and voluntary exchange allow the accumulation of profit (with exception to government coercion, once again).

You can't have capitalism without government coercion, you need extensive property rights, you need entity creation (like corporations) and so on.

I have no problem with trading and organizing economies voluntarily without the state, but you need to first come up with the framework.

 

[TNAR]

Being covered by Fannie Mae isn't subsidation

Fannie Mae is a nearly textbook definition of an indirect subsidy. The government guarantees potential losses to lenders which has the direct result of lowering interest rates paid by homeowners. Not all subsidies are direct monetary grants.

Of caorse their would be, recessions bubbles and so on make members of the rulling class extremely rich.

So you suggest that rather than simply control the economy and become obscenely rich in this manner, the ruling class purposely creates bubbles which have the additional effect of making the people agitated and restless? I don't buy it.

A buisiness isn't a person its a social relation.

Businesses are not autonomous entities; they must be controlled by an actual human being with real desires and motives. Businesses are simply the means to attain personal ends.

You can't have capitalism without government coercion, you need extensive property rights, you need entity creation (like corporations) and so on.

Property rights and contracts are not reliant on government coercion. These are social mores which have been codified by governments. The framework you are looking for already exists. Unfortunately, it is being manipulated and restricted by government. You don't need a government to tell you not to steal from your neighbor, do you? You don't steal from your neighbor because it is wrong and you wouldn't want your neighbor to steal from you. Voluntary transactions are devoid of scams and lies because they require peaceful cooperation for continued success. Only government supported entities can lie and cheat and steal and continue to be accepted.

 

[JP Hochbaum]

Fannie Mae is a nearly textbook definition of an indirect subsidy. The government guarantees potential losses to lenders which has the direct result of lowering interest rates paid by homeowners. Not all subsidies are direct monetary grants.

The original conversation on subsidies was about subsidizing homeowners not bank losses. Subsidizing homeowners has had its proven success.

 

[TNAR]

The original conversation on subsidies was about subsidizing homeowners not bank losses. Subsidizing homeowners has had its proven success.

You need to make up your mind. I have yet to mention bank losses so I'll assume that you are changing your position on Fannie et alia?

What proven successes have accompanied subsidizing home ownership?

 

[phattonez]

They tried that before ... People starve, most peopel are not unemployed because they are lazy, its structural problems.

Are you tacitly saying that you want to hand out money to those who can work but choose not to?

 

[JP Hochbaum]

Are you tacitly saying that you want to hand out money to those who can work but choose not to?

I think the fact that this is a thread on a jobs bill, I am assuming that would be a no.

 

[DA60]

I have another idea...

...end unemployment payments and welfare and Medicare/Medicaid (except for those presently over 45).

Replace it with government 'welfare centers' - facilities in every large city in America (run by the federal government) where people can go and get emergency food, shelter, clothing, medical/dental care (full health care for those under 18 - children should not be punished for having semi-useless parents).

No one need suffer from starvation, exposure or relatively simple medical conditions.

But if you want more - you have to earn it.

If you want more without earning it - use a charity. If none are available - tough.



As for guaranteeing everyone a job?

If the government can accomplish that within low taxation AND a balanced budget...power to them.

If they cannot - forget it.

 

[cpwill]

1. If this is "workfare" wherein you simply have to perform jobs the state or local government needs doing in order to collect the benefit as already defined, fine.

2. If this is an actual "jobs guarantee" and people are going to be sitting around doing make-work crap for years on end, forget it.

So long as this doesn't cost any more than current unemployment / welfare :shrug: I could see advantages. So long as the people involved were on the same time limit and could be fired.

 

[RGacky3]

So you suggest that rather than simply control the economy and become obscenely rich in this manner, the ruling class purposely creates bubbles which have the additional effect of making the people agitated and restless? I don't buy it.

THey don't do it coordinatedly like "haha, lets make a bubble), but they all individually add to the bubble, even if they know its a bubble, because they can make money off inflating it and its bursting could generally be an externality, i.e. someone elses problem.

Businesses are not autonomous entities; they must be controlled by an actual human being with real desires and motives. Businesses are simply the means to attain personal ends.

No ****, thats why I said its a social relation.

Property rights and contracts are not reliant on government coercion. These are social mores which have been codified by governments. The framework you are looking for already exists. Unfortunately, it is being manipulated and restricted by government. You don't need a government to tell you not to steal from your neighbor, do you? You don't steal from your neighbor because it is wrong and you wouldn't want your neighbor to steal from you. Voluntary transactions are devoid of scams and lies because they require peaceful cooperation for continued success. Only government supported entities can lie and cheat and steal and continue to be accepted.

A: they've ALWAYS been reliant on government coersion, no one has ever owned a vast estate without state coercion, no one has ever owned a large company wihtout state coercion.

B: You don't need a government to tell you to steal from your neighbor, but you do need government to tell me that that swath of land over there belongs exlusively to my neighbor even though he's over here, and thus would legally make me picking apples from it "stealing."

C: ALL buisinesses are government supported entities, ALL CORPORATIONS are actually made by the state.

D: Your living in lala land.

Are you tacitly saying that you want to hand out money to those who can work but choose not to?

No, I'm tacitly saying that Capitalism doesn't work and we need a new system. Also there very very few people who can actually choose to work but refuse to, the reason people are unemployed is not because suddenly in 2008 everyone got lazy, it was a crisis in capitalism.

 

[JP Hochbaum]

1. If this is "workfare" wherein you simply have to perform jobs the state or local government needs doing in order to collect the benefit as already defined, fine.

2. If this is an actual "jobs guarantee" and people are going to be sitting around doing make-work crap for years on end, forget it.

So long as this doesn't cost any more than current unemployment / welfare :shrug: I could see advantages. So long as the people involved were on the same time limit and could be fired.

It would be permanent, but it would work just like unemployment: increasing in recessions and decreasing when the economy recovers.

The JG would be set up as a wage floor, so that those on the JG would still have the incentive to find a private sector job.

The cost really shouldn't be a deterrent, the costs of unemployment are far more costly.

 

[TNAR]

THey don't do it coordinatedly like "haha, lets make a bubble), but they all individually add to the bubble ... because they can make money off inflating it ...

Sounds to me like it is you who lives in lala land. You adapt the evidence to your pre-conceived conclusions. No amount of logic will convince ideology of its ignorance.

No ****, thats why I said its a social relation.

You are almost as bad at jumping around as Cardinal Fang.

Every person and business on the face of the earth has the primary goal of the removal of pain and uneasiness.

A buisiness isn't a person its a social relation. Profit is the goal of buisiness

Businesses are simply the means to attain personal ends.

I'm beginning to think that you don't necessarily disagree with what I'm saying, you simply want to disagree with me.

no one has ever owned a vast estate without state coercion

Even if that were true, which it is not, so what? No one had ever flown before the invention of the airplane, so what's your point? The state is the only way we can live because that's the only way it's ever been done before? You lack imagination and creativity, man!

Billions of dollars change hands every single day without the potential coercion of government backing it up with little difficulty. Open your eyes.

 

[cmakaioz]

A job guarantee is eminently sensible, relatively humane (short of the longer and much harder struggle to defeat coercive economics generally), and reliably profitable for local and regional economies.

For precisely these reasons, it is and will remain something fought against tooth and nail by the powers that be, as it threatens the leverage born of surplus labor. Companies and industries with traditionally low pay (food service, retail) will fight to the death against it, as will any employer at or near the bottom rung of the wage ladder, as the "or Else" part of "accept ****ty pay Or Else" would be a whole lot less compelling if and when people had something to fall back on.

The central question of proposing a job guarantee is not so much whether or not it would be effective (it will), but rather how to overcome the entrenched opposition to it coming from elites.

 

[imagep]

No, I'm tacitly saying that Capitalism doesn't work and we need a new system. Also there very very few people who can actually choose to work but refuse to, the reason people are unemployed is not because suddenly in 2008 everyone got lazy, it was a crisis in capitalism.

I was considering "liking" your post (not that you care) until I read your last statement.

Capitalism can work and does work and has worked very well in the US for over 200 years, although there are faults with the way that we operate our capitalistic system. We don't need to thow it away, we need to fine tune it.