Jobs

Originally posted September 23rd, 2010

The big topic these days is jobs and how to create them. Most proposals that we see do not seem to gather great support from the American public. We believe that the main reason for luke-warm support for many proposals like more stimulus money, or more tax cuts, is that most people don't trust the motives of those offering new ideas. How do you build trust in new ideas? We think that the key is to make people part of the idea, what we often mean by the phrase have "skin in the game." Here is what we propose.

The key to a jobs program is to identify job creating projects that are concrete and doable as quickly as possible. The concrete programs are often identified as "infrastructure" projects--roads, bridges, public buildings--things that people use on a daily basis and are seen as beneficial to many people. We all benefit from the rebuilding of deteriorating infrastructure in the places where we live.

Infrastructure projects should be generated by public discussion and public meetings in the areas where the projects are located. Meeting with the public would be the technical people like engineers who would describe what needs to be done; it would include the contractors who are interested in bidding for work on the project, and labor groups who would provide the carpenters, electricians, and other labor; it would include political officials who who would provide guidance with the regulations, and legal requirements for large-scale public projects. The elected public officials would be responsible creating the proposals that will compete for the money to fund infrastructure projects.

The next step is find the money to pay for infrastructure projects. That's a subject for another blog.