General Motors Co. is freezing the pay of its 26,000 U.S. salaried employees and will eliminate its traditional pension contribution for those salaried workers who still receive them in moves to reduce financial risks and cut costs.
And spend the money instead on 90 weeks of unemployment for all those people and 90 weeks of unemployment for all the people laid off from supporting industries and 90 weeks of unemployment for all the people laid off from industries that provide services to all of those laid off people? Or just not spend that money either and spend money instead on extra policing and prisons to deal with the rising number of desperate people, or not pay that either and just cede the territories of lawlessness and unrest to some other power that was willing to put in the political time and energy - maybe communists or nazis. Do you even bother thinking one step ahead?
Way too much time, way too much and if you look at the data around the world, those who get a job while on unemployment, majority of them do so in the last four weeks of coverage. Whyzzat? Actually, I'm thinking multiple steps ahead when dealing with those delusional people that think Keynesian Economics actually works. Had we Americans (not you Canadians) elected someone who had a clue about the economy and how it works, 99 weeks would never have been needed as the economy would have begun to grow again and creating jobs. Only way to do that is to cut taxes, cut inflationary practices (read a country spending money they don't have and just print more of it), cut the budget, and stifle if not give relief of the godawful regulations that is churned out on a daily basis. The only direction a government can drive a national economy is into the ground. It takes people with money to create wealth, Marxist have repeatedly proven they are incapable of building wealth, other then by force from their neighbors. Now let me give you an prime example of my dear sister-in-law. She was terminated from her job and got max (in the State of Florida) unemployment comp payments. Did she need to get this as a bartender? No, she could have gotten a job easily, she is a very good looking woman who has been in the industry for nearly two decades, including fine dining. But she did get the checks, and refused to go look for another job while she has 99 weeks of paying her minimum wage to sit on her ass. Six months go by, still no job. She probably has a job by now, the 99 weeks are about up.
It's certainly true that once benefits run out people will settle for jobs that they otherwise would not have taken. They are often not jobs that will pay the mortgage. During good times people can get back into the job market quickly but tend to take their time trying to find something suitable. In the bad times people just can't get jobs. Thinking that making people desperate for jobs will cause those jobs to appear is like thinking that being hungry magically makes food appear. Keynesian Economics hasn't been practised in three decades. Keynesianism is to borrow and spend in the downturn and to tax and save in the up. What American politicians have been doing is spending in the downturns and spending in the upturns. Now they want to go further and spend in good times but tax and save in the bad times. That's like going on a diet when you are starving but eating when you are fat - completely the opposite of Keynes. Which is just another form of spending - a Keynesian stimulus Which would nullify the "spending" in taxes not collected. You have no idea what money is nor what wealth is, it seems.
There are two faulty assumptions here. The first is that it's only the 47K workers. It is directly. And both workers and GM spend more money which indirectly supports more workers. The other faulty assumption is that the Gov won't get their investment back. The Chrysler bail out returned the money in full last time. And didn't they just pay back about $7.6 Billion with interest? While the GM deal isn't as good (imo) chances are there will be some payback. I think the US might lose something. But that something is far less than the full amount of the GM bailout. Ford did take out a loan. The reason it could do this, was in part, due to the government bailing out the auto sector. Had that not been underway it's very unlikely Ford would have gotten the loan as the amount would have to be far bigger to help sustain their supplier vendors. http://wot.motortrend.com/exported-ford-takes-250-million-loan-from-us-exportimport-bank-9416.html GM and Ford are making cars, today here in the 21st century, which rival any other automaker. Hurrah neighbor! I was unlucky enough in the Toyota Avalon. You can probably do a search and find my stories on this vehicle. Never had I had any US car rebuild heads in 80K miles or replace an engine in under 170K. Never again. I'm not just talking post-911. Look over time and it's clear airlines wouldn't be where they are today without government funding. If the question is the impact of President's fiscal policy then you must align fiscal years. When Obama's first Budget passed late in 2009 unemployment was over 10%. Now it's back to near 8%. Almost every sector is hiring. The one noteable is government jobs. Oh and you might want to subtrack the Bush Gov increases from jobs. If you only look at private the Bush years are a net loss. Buy low sell high - it's the money making mantra of wallstreet and others. Today the labor for construction jobs is low, the materials are flat, and the cost to borrow is low. If you want gov. to save money the time to fix the infrastructure is now. Not in 5 years when labor is higher, materials are higher, and cost to borrow is higher. Now this assumes the Country returns. If it doesn't then well all bets are off anyway. I would agree the Gov hasn't done a proper job in ensuring regulations and following up on fraud. Though I would also say that failing to enforce the law is no better than if the law didn't exist. And if you want unregulated capitalism what's going on with failures to enforce are equivalent to having no laws. EG you're seeing unregulated capitalism, essentially what you asked for. As for corporate welfare I thought you might find this interesting, and may want to stop shopping at Wal-Mart. As all of us are paying for them to exist, even if we don't shop there. http://blogcritics.org/politics/art...: bc/politics (Blogcritics Section: Politics)
