(i) Even Conservatives Should Support A Job Guarantee¹

(ii) Albuquerque’s “Better Way” Experiment²

“For the past year, Albuquerque has been experimenting with a pilot jobs program for its homeless population called “There’s a Better Way.” The initiative began as a push to connect the homeless with shelters and other assistance providers, but within a few months of its launch, the city also started offering needy residents $9 an hour to perform menial labor such as cleaning up litter. The program also offers lunch and overnight shelter to participants.

Now “There’s a Better Way” is expanding to offer more work, and receiving a bit of national attention in the process. The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, and CityLab have all run laudatory articles over the past couple of weeks, and other cities are reportedly keen to emulate Albuquerque model. According to the Post, Mayor Richard Berry reported that “dozens” of municipalities have contacted his administration to learn how they might implement similar programs.

(…)

This version of the policy would resemble something close to a job guarantee targeted specifically at Albuquerque’s homeless population. At the very least, expanding the “Better Way” model could test out some of a job guarantee’s purported advantages.

For those unfamiliar with the term, a job guarantee is exactly what it sounds like: A blanket offer of public sector employment to any unemployed, able-bodied adults who want it. Academics like Duke public policy expert Sandy Darity and Bard economist Pavlina Tcherneva have been studying the proposal for years, but it hasn’t quite captured the public’s attention like, say, recent calls for a universal basic income. Nonetheless, I think there are some good reasons we might prefer an employment program to unconditional cash transfers, and Albuquerque’s experience showcases them nicely.

(…)

When Argentina implemented the public employment campaign known as Jefes in 2002, participants reported they were glad for the sense of purpose the job gave them. A survey conducted by Argentina’s Ministry of Labor found that approximately 85% of Jefes participants were either “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the program (…).

(iii) 50 volte NO all’Unione Europea e all’euro di Paolo Becchi e Fabio Dragoni³

(…)

Perché economie diverse devono avere monete diverse

(…)

Perché non è vero che uscire da un’Unione Monetaria sarebbe una catastrofe

(…)

Perché fuori dall’Unione Europea si sta comunque meglio

(…)

Perché non è vero che tutta colpa del debito pubblico

(…)

Perché non è vero che se la BCE si comportasse come la FED riusciremmo a superare la crisi rimanendo nell’euro

(…)

Perché non vero che l’austerità paga

(…)

Perché non è vero che il problema sono le nostre pensioni troppo alte

(…)

Perché non è vero che non è possibile un referendum su Ue e euro

(iv) The Economist: Where does the buck stop?⁴

“(…) The book is filled with economic insights. Yet its most important contribution is the reasoning behind the proposition that when an economy is operating below full employment, demand rather than supply determines the level of investment and national income. Keynes supposed there was a “multiplier effect” from changes in investment spending.

(…)

In this world, lowering interest rates to stimulate growth does not help very much. Nor are rates very sensitive to increases in government borrowing, given the glut of saving. Government spending to boost the economy could therefore generate a big rise in employment for only a negligible increase in interest rates.

(…)

Yet in Japan since the 1990s, and in most of the rich world since the recession that followed the global financial crisis, cutting interest rates to zero has proved inadequate to revive flagging economies. Many governments turned instead to fiscal stimulus to get their economies going. In America the administration of Barack Obama succeeded in securing a stimulus package worth over $800 billion.

(…)

Even as many policymakers remain committed to fiscal consolidation, plenty of economists now argue that insufficient fiscal stimulus has been among the biggest failures of the post-crisis era. Mr Summers and Antonio Fatas suggest, for example, that austerity has substantially reduced growth, leading to levels of public debt that are higher than they would have been had enthusiastic stimulus been used to revive growth. (…)”

(v) Economist: Guaranteed living-wage jobs best way to address inequality⁵

… African-American economics professor Darrick Hamilton is proposing federally-guaranteed jobs, at living wages, for everyone.

(…)

Hamilton began his talk by saying that “much of the framing around racial disparity” in income and wealth “is tied to a ‘culture of poverty’ and low acquisition of education.”

That’s tantamount to blaming the victim, though he did not use those words.

Instead, policy should focus on lack of available jobs, even when the economy is going full-blast, for African-Americans and other minorities. Policymakers, Hamilton declared, should be “addressing labor market conditions” that create poverty “in the first place.”

And to solve those, he declared, “The better choice is a job guarantee.”

Policymakers, he said, have put “an overemphasis on education” as a solution to problems of race, income, and wealth.

“That follows from the neoliberal perspective that the ‘free market’ is supposed to be the solution to all of our problems. But it does not address underlying structures of income and wealth disparity.” And, he said, “the unemployed themselves want to work.”

His program, presented to the group, includes guaranteed jobs for all, with a minimum salary of $23,000 yearly, along with $10,000 worth of guaranteed benefits, such as health insurance and pensions. (…)

… His proposed program includes “public infrastructure support for developing both physical capital” – roads, bridges, subways, railroads, airport, broadband, etc. – “and human capital,” such as investing to make child care, health care, and care of the elderly well-paid, well-skilled work.

(…)

Hamilton calculated the guaranteed jobs program would cost $750 billion⁶ yearly, less than the $787 billion economic stimulus package Congress enacted in 2009. “Blacks were grossly underrepresented in the stimulus” spending, due to its business tax cuts, he added. (…)

(vi) Mazzucato: Private Debt Is the Problem, Not Deficits⁷

(vii) The Minskys: The History of Money: Not What You Think⁸

 

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1 Ikus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlFdSbf5AIs&sns=tw.