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The United Stateshas just completed its third year of economic recovery, but the unemploymentrate remains above 8%, and there are worrisome signs of a slowdown. So it is nosurprise that jobs have become a major focus in the presidential campaign – orthat the candidates have very different ideas about how to boost employment.
Last autumn, President Barack Obama proposed the AmericanJobs Act, a $450 billion package of fiscal measures aimed at jobcreation. The AJA amounted to about 3% of GDP and was designed to take effectin 2012, providing a timely employment boost and insurance for the USrecovery against global headwinds. Most ofits measures had enjoyed bipartisan supportin the past; tax cuts comprised about 56% of the total cost; and the packagewas paid for in Obama’s long-term deficit reduction plan.
Several independent economists concluded that Obama’s plan would provide asignificant lift to the job market in 2012-2013. Indeed, two of the nation’smost respected forecasters predicted that the AJA would add 1.3-1.9 millionjobs in 2012 and more than two million jobs by the end of 2013. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO)also found that most of the AJA’s policies rankedhigh in budgetary effectiveness, measured by the number of jobs created in2012-2013 per dollar of budgetary cost.
The AJA was filibustered by SenateRepublicans, and the Republican-controlled Houseof Representatives likewise prevented the bill from coming to a vote. Mitt Romney,now the Republican presidential candidate, attacked the plan as “mere stimulus”that would “throw a cup of gasoline on the embers”of the recovery. Ultimately, Obama, bolsteredby polls endorsing his plan, won partial passage of two AJA policies: a one-thirdcut in employees’ payroll taxes (he had proposed one-half), and an extension ofunemployment benefits by about 60% of what he had recommended.
But Congress failed to approve a 50% cut in employers’ payroll taxes – abusiness tax cut that many Republicans favored in the past and that ranks highon budgetary effectiveness. Nor did Congress approve $30 billion in federalgrants to states to enable them to employ about 135,000 teachers, police, andfiremen, despite strong voter support. Such grants between 2009 and 2011,totaling $130 billion, helped states to maintain vital services and retain thepublic employees providing them.
Romney opposes more federal money for the states, arguing that “it is timeto cut back on government and help the American people.” But teachers, firemen,and police are American people who help other American people. Governmentemployment is falling at the fastest rate since the 1940’s, and is now at its 2006 level. If publicemployment had grown during the last three years at about the same rate as thepopulation, as it did during George W. Bush’s presidency, the unemployment ratewould be around 7% rather than 8.2%, owing to about 800,000 additional jobs.
Likewise, Congress failed to approve Obama’s call for $90 billion in additionalinfrastructure spending, which would have supported about 400,000 jobs, despitethe fact that the UShas at least $1.1 trillion in unfunded infrastructure needs. Moreover,infrastructure investment not only creates jobs in the near term, but also promoteslong-term competitiveness.
Altogether, Congress left at least one million jobs on the negotiatingtable, holding unemployed workers hostage tothe outcome of November’s election.
Meanwhile, in response to persistent media pressure, Romney has unveiledhis policies to boost short-term job creation. They are not convincing. Romneysays that he would ensure that the US puts more people to work in theenergy sector. But, while the oil and gas industry has grown significantlysince 2007, it employs fewer than 200,000 people, implying a negligible effect even if employment in thissector doubled in the short run.
And, while Romney says that he would open new foreign markets, Obama hasbeen doing just that, winning passage of three major trade agreements andincreasing federal support for US exports, which have been growing nearly twiceas fast as they did during the recovery from the 2001 recession. Moreover,Romney’s promise to charge China, America’s third-largest exportmarket, with currency manipulation, and to impose large tariffs on Chineseimports, would almost certainly invite retaliation,causing a decline in US exports and jobs.
Romney would also repeal “Obamacare” –the 2010 health-care reform legislation – because it “is scaring small business from hiring.” But theevidence for this claim is meager and anecdotal. A recent survey found that mostsmall businesses support the reform. Most businesses, large and small, citeinsufficient demand as the primary reason they are not hiring.
Nor is Romney’s promise to enact immediate cuts in federal discretionary spending by an additional 5% likelyto boost job growth, as he asserts. When an economy is suffering from highunemployment and weak aggregate demand,spending cuts are contractionary. Romney conceded this point recently, acknowledging thatthe “fiscal cliff” – the expiration of Bush-era tax cuts at the end of thisyear, combined with large spending cuts already scheduled to take effect –would push the economy back into recession.
Finally, in addition to extending Bush’s tax cuts, Romney promises an across-the-board 20% reduction in marginalpersonal-income-tax rates and a significant cut in the corporate rate toencourage businesses to hire more workers. Despite large cuts in marginalincome-tax rates at the start of the Bush administration, however, job growthbetween 2000 and 2007 was half the rate of the previous three decades.
Even if Romney’s new tax cuts strengthened investment and growth in thelong run (a debatable proposition that depends on how they are financed), theirshort-term effect on job creation would be minimal,and they would entail a significant loss of revenue. Indeed, these cuts performpoorly on the CBO’s measure of budgetary effectiveness.
Obama’s proposals to boost job creation are convincing, whereas Romney’sproposals would have little or no effect – and some could even make mattersworse. Voters need to know the difference.
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