Forum Post: Can BIG GOVERNMENT be a good thing?
Posted 12 years ago on Jan. 23, 2012, 7:20 p.m. EST by arturo
(3169)
from Shanghai, Shanghai
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
Having communicated with a number of the diverse participants here, I've seen how conservatives, particularly libertarians usually think of government, especially big government, as something close to evil and the major source of our economic problems today.
Many of the liberals here, also seem to not be clear on what positive role government should play in creating an economic recovery. So I would like to discuss the possibility of how big government could actually play a positive role in helping our country get back on its feet again.
I'd like to suggest that a combination of two big government programs could be applied to solving our economic problems today. These are FDR's New Deal, which conservatives generally seem to abhor, and JFK's space program, which conservatives seem to have more sympathy for.
I'd like to suggest that now is the time for these two kinds of programs to work together, that is, the New Deal approach to developing the infrastructure of the US, combined with the high technology of the space program. I propose that what we need is an infrastructure development program that incorporates the high technology equivalent of what we had in Kennedy's space program.
This means, for example, a program to solve the problems of nuclear energy, disposal of waste, etc., as well as the progression from fission to fusion power, and its application on a wide scale. The result would be a clean and dense source of energy that would power our economic recovery.
This would be combined with high tech transportation, especially, magnetic levitation trains, which are powered by electricity and actually "fly" over the track on a magnetic field. These are known to be more quite, more efficient and cleaner than conventional rail.
These kinds of programs would create millions of high paid, high skilled jobs, as well as requiring the rebuilding of our manufacturing base through the start-up of many private, high tech manufacturing companies. They would also improve the efficiency of our economy as a whole, creating revenue to pay themselves off.
An alternative to Wall Street would be necessary to finance projects of these immense proportions, particularly, a national bank, which could make low interest rate loans since it would not have to pay profit to private owners. Instead, the profit would accrue to the millions of workers as well as the private companies that would be employed by these projects.
Such programs would have to be repaid over the long term, perhaps fifty years, because this is the kind of time frame that is required for real development. What do you think?
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I think you should see some of Jefferson's quotes on national banks. Secondly, as far as job creation goes,
Suppose you buy old furniture and paint. Using your labor, you clean the furniture and refinish it, then sell it. You have increased the value of the furniture by the sale price minus what you paid for the furniture and paint.
Your labor has produced that exact amount of wealth.
Now suppose the government pays you with someone else's money to go into the forest and paint tree trunks.
You have a job, just as you did in the first scenario. The government has "created a job". But in the second scenario, you are not helping anyone else.
People often say they want the government to "create jobs". But unless you are doing something desired by another person, you are not creating wealth. And if the government was paying you to do something desired by another person, there would be no need for the government in the scenario, the people could pay you directly.
It doesn't matter if you are painting tree trunks or sending a rocket to the moon, if you are not helping another person the affect on the economy is the same.
I'm sorry, but I disagree with a few premises. You are thinking only in terms of demand and consumption. You are not considering the research and innovation that go into projects like this.
These functions raise the economy to a higher level, rather than just stimulating demand and consumption. For example, the space program resulted in the birth of a whole new industry, the aerospace industry, that offered lots of high-skilled, good paying jobs that hadn't previously existed, plus other benefits to the economy, such as satellites.
The key is to create a "trajectory" of innovation, that allows us to attain continuously higher levels of energy, and tap intro previously unavailable resources. This will be increasingly necessary, as we continue to exhaust the resources we have been using.
It is necessary and it happens. When a highly desired resource comes into short supply, the price goes up. Oil, for example. There are hundreds of different ways to produce a nearly infinite amount of petroleum products, from distilling coal to producing liquid fuel from carbon dioxide, hydrogen and electricity. The key factor is cost, when the price of these things goes up it spurs people to invest in new ways to produce them. The idea that we are "running out of oil" is false, the only factor is that the price of oil is going up and less efficient ways of producing it must be sought.
The economy raises itself to a higher level on its own. Satellites were developed for entirely constitutional purposes, namely the military. The government rightly let some of the technology out and let the public use them. They were not and should not have been developed so people could watch Jersey Shore from anywhere in the country or go to Burger King without a map. If there was sufficient demand for these things there would be a market for them and someone would build the satellites on their own.
Some of the investments that need to be made for progress to occur are too big for individuals or even companies alone to make. This is why government needs to make investments in projects like the space program.
I agree completely, but I think government should be limited to doing the things that people can not do, either through lack of authority (military, interstate highways) or lack of resources. But In general I do hold that too many of the things government does do not fall into these categories, and people should be weary when they call for the government to "create jobs" without finding out if the jobs are going to produce anything useful.
The market keeps the middlemen out normally, people want things and have money for them and find other people to give the money to and provide the goods they want. If the government is to directly create jobs, they must take money from the buyer, pay themselves, and give it to a seller to provide a good the buyer may not have wanted. This takes time...
The stimulus money is a perfect example. It took -years- for the government to spend all of the money congress appointed to it for "job creation". If that money had stayed in the hands of the people it was taken from, it would have been spent in a matter of hours.
Yes, jobs must be for something useful. Some of the examples I gave were advanced public transportation and energy systems. These stimulate the economy, allowing more people to work and travel more efficiently.
And yes, it does take time for projects, real development can take decades, for example, something like Hoover dam. But we need these things.
Are you aware that our national infrastructure has received C and D ratings from the Army Corp of Engineers? These represent massive disasters that are just awaiting to occur, like in the hurricane Katrina.
I don't think the stimulus money provided by Obama is a good example of what we want. In my book, he works for the enemy, that is Wall Street. I would consider FDR a better example, though I know many conservatives hate him.