Bush and factory jobs
An editorial
September 3, 2003
madison.com
Since President Bush assumed office on Jan. 20,
2001, the United States has lost more than 2.5
million manufacturing jobs - roughly 50,000 of
which came from Wisconsin. When the
president should have been focused on the
hemorrhaging of vital industries, he instead
poured his energies into cutting taxes for the
super-rich. The manufacturing job losses are
the tip of the economic iceberg. According to the U.S. Labor Department, more
than 9 million Americans are looking for work. And while there has been some
upturn in manufacturing orders in recent days, there is little evidence in the lives of
unemployed Americans to suggest that the United States has turned the corner
out of Bush's recession.
However, now that the 2004 election season is just around the corner, the
president says he "gets it." "There's a problem with the manufacturing sector,"
Bush told a Labor Day rally in Ohio, where he wore a union-man costume that
looked almost as silly as the flight suit he pulled on to declare in May that the
United States had accomplished its mission in Iraq.
Bush coupled his newfound understanding - or should we call it his "election
season conversion"? - with a pledge to activate a federal government that has
paid little attention to dislocated workers.
Performing his best FDR imitation, Bush announced, "We have a responsibility that
when somebody hurts, the government has to move."
But how should the government move? Hopefully not with more of the same.
Bush trade representatives continue to aggressively push for international trade
agreements that have been proven to undermine job security, wages, benefits
and environmental protections not just in the United States but in the countries
we trade with. The "race to the bottom" that began with the North American Free
Trade Agreement will be accelerated by a Free Trade Area of the Americas
agreement that critics correctly refer to as "NAFTA on steroids." So if government
wants to aid American manufacturing workers, step one is to step back from the
FTAA.
Bush economic aides, and their allies in the Congress, continue to push for a
trickle-down economics approach that relies on tax cuts for the rich to restart the
economy. But two years into the experiment, the trickle-down theory is failing just
as miserably as it did when Ronald Reagan was president.
The trick is to get money to working people who actually spend it, rather than to
millionaires who bank their tax rebates - or use them to shift business operations
to the Bahamas. So if government wants to aid American manufacturing workers,
step two is to put the brakes on implementation of tax cuts for the rich and shift
the money to unemployment benefits and job creation.
If President Bush took these two simple steps, people might believe him when he
says, "I believe there are better days ahead for people who are working and
looking for work."
Then again, if he fails to take these steps, working people and people looking for
work might just bring on the better days by electing a better president.
Published: 8:40 AM 9/03/03 |
