Where Are the Jobs?

December 9, 2009 3:18 PM 

It seems to me this Job Summit last week in Washington is necessary but way late in the big scheme of things. I know Obama inherited all the problems of the last administration and he can’t fix everything overnight. But if you really think about it, no single problem he has tried to tackle is more important than the creation of jobs. Why? Forget commercial real estate for a minute and I’ll get back to that later. Let’s start with healthcare (which should really be called “sickness” care). If the 7 million people now out of work had jobs most would not have lost their health insurance and the subject would not be so critical. Then there’s the home foreclosure problem. If the 7 million people who lost jobs were employed they could make their house payments and keep their homes. How about the war in Afghanistan? It seems like Obama’s decision to get in and get out in 18 months was in large part a function of the cost ($30 billion) of sending 30,000 more troops to the area. Because so many are out of work and have no income, they are not paying income taxes into the Dept. of Revenue. The IRS coffers are fuller when only 5% are unemployed vs. 10-11%. Now back to employment and how it has hit the commercial real estate business. All the empty stores and office spaces, not to mention the industrial buildings are a function of jobs lost and businesses failed. Businesses need to hire people (create jobs) to fill up all the empty spaces. When that happens, landlords get their rent money and can afford to pay their mortgage payments. That keeps them out of foreclosure. Fewer foreclosures help keep the banks from failing. So I ask Obama, what took so long to hold this job summit? Isn’t it obvious that instead of throwing stimulus money at your campaign supporters, instead of giving money to people to buy cars, instead of giving money to people who buy existing housing stock, why not give incentives to businesses to hire employees and put people on a payroll back to work? How simple is this concept? This would solve a myriad of problems for our Federal, State, local governments and our overall economy. I’m talking about jobs for people who actually make stuff that other people buy and use. The retail and service jobs will fall in place after that. Let me know what you think. Did the Jobs Summit do any good?