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Obama forum an admission that stimulus not working
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President Barack Obama today announced that he would convene a jobs forum in December. The forum will bring together the usual suspects; chief executive officers, labor leaders, governors, and cabinet officials; all meeting, I suppose, to come up with ideas as to how to create jobs.
You can't fault the president for trying. It's his job to manage the economy; to get us to full employment. It's also his sincere concern that Americans get back to work. The situation is becoming dire, with a current unemployment rate of 10.2% and expectations that the rate will continue climbing into the early part of 2010. It's not as if the administration did not warn us. Mr. Obama has made it a point to let us know that the ride to recovery will be a rough and painful one.
The problem with forums, however, is that...well...they just don't work. How many groups of important people need to sit down every few months to wax philosophical about the pain we are going through? What additional information can these forum members provide? Doesn't the president have a Council of Economic Advisors? What about the National Economic Council?
Announcing this forum only gives the Republicans more fodder to say, "See. We told you so." Holding this forum nine months into a stimulus package, right about the time multipler effects should be kicking in, is an admission that there was something structurally wrong with the package. Its been nine months and the job growth boat has already left the dock.
Cynics could argue that this is a big show and tell to set up StimPac part 2. I hope not. It would not be politically feasible, not with a health bill that will be debated to death by the Senate well past Christmas. If the government is going to use any federal expenditures for job creation, paying for some business tax credits with left-over TARP money may do the trick. Additional tax credits should be considered as the Administration and the Congress prepare the fiscal year 2011 budget.
From here on out, the American citizen has got to start thinking outside the box when it comes to job creation. Government can't do it. Government can promote commerce and infrastructure but it will be left up to innovation for jobs to be created. We will have to become more aggressive when it comes to selling our goods and services abroad. Aggressive doesn't mean weakening the dollar any further. Aggressive means bringing jobs back home, standing behind the quality of our work, marketing our wares, and getting tough on foreign currency policies and tariffs.
It's time to get our swagger on. No more bandages in the form of stimulus and unemployment compensation extensions. Its time to think long term. Its time to get tough. And please. No more forums.
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