[southernmissouri2007]

Can money made by the paychecks by the Workers working for Public Works be used to buy goods and services which would create Consumer Demand and Consumer Spending in the Private Sector Economy ?

President Obama’s $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — “the stimulus” — originally offered nearly $400 billion for infrastructure projects until the republithugs threw another tantrum and hijacked $260 billion of it for tax cuts. That’s one third of the entire stimulus package. No wonder it hasn’t worked as well as it could have. Now they’re whining that the stimulus didn’t create enough jobs. Well, duh. That’s because tax cuts don’t create jobs. Only consumer demand for products and services does that.


Those things are new and repaired roads, bridges, dams, harbors, levees, tunnels, buildings, schools, parking garages, subways, railways, parks, sewers, stadiums, airports, and other public facilities. That spending creates jobs for construction companies and workers. Those projects create demand for the supplies, equipment, tools, and other materials that they need for those projects. It creates demand for the trucking companies to ship them and the warehouses to store them. That creates jobs in all of those industries. If the companies supplying the construction industry have enough work, they can spend some of their revenue to hire more employees or to upgrade their own facilities. See, more demand, more jobs.

Then all of those workers have paychecks that they can spend on groceries, clothing, furniture, cars, houses, utilities, entertainment, appliances, restaurants, vacations, and all sorts of things. That creates demand in those industries. And that creates jobs. If those companies have enough work, they can spend some of their revenue to hire more employees or to upgrade their own facilities. See, more demand, more jobs. And government gets its new stuff built and its old stuff fixed. See. Everybody wins.

http://patomalley.wordpress.com/2011/06 ... e-economy/

[Daktoria]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of ... ken_window

Your model only works if infrastructure is wearing out fast enough for people to have to maintain it.

Encouraging that kind of consumerism is incredibly haphazard. Number one, it encourages people to be stupid (in consuming just to wear things out) which means you'll discourage people from thinking about how to construct, maintain, and budget infrastructure in the first place. Yes, there will be more menial jobs, but no, there won't be enough engineers.

Number two, you're expecting the circular flow of income to be self-sustaining. The money paid to workers will have to equate to the money spent on consumption. The problem is there's no motive for that. Why would anyone manage a project without profit? The manager would just end up getting used like a bitch, and worse than that, worker-consumers would call the manager selfish if the manager wants to be treated with self-defined dignity.

Are you working to live, or living to work?

[Wolfman]

Your model only works if infrastructure is wearing out fast enough for people to have to maintain it.

There are major depressions on average every 30 years. Also about the amount of time that major repairs to infrastructure are recommended.

it encourages people to be stupid (in consuming just to wear things out)

I don't understand what you're saying. Infrastructure is something that always needs to exist, and will always wear out. How is using the already needed repair of infrastructure as a spring board to mend a broken economy any different then fixing infrastructure normally?

which means you'll discourage people from thinking about how to construct, maintain, and budget infrastructure in the first place. Yes, there will be more menial jobs, but no, there won't be enough engineers.

Not really, as you'll always need to rebuild, fix up, or expand infrastructure.

you're expecting the circular flow of income to be self-sustaining. The money paid to workers will have to equate to the money spent on consumption. The problem is there's no motive for that. Why would anyone manage a project without profit? The manager would just end up getting used like a bitch, and worse than that, worker-consumers would call the manager selfish if the manager wants to be treated with self-defined dignity.

Or the manager of the project is the government, who doesn't need to make a profit. The government pays its workers and buys the needed supplies from the market, and the economy recovers. Blah blah blah. It's worked a dozen times in a dozen places, under a dozen circumstances. It's not like this is some untested hypothesis.

Are you working to live, or living to work?

This is capitalism, you live to work.

[Daktoria]

Wolf, put it this way.

The rate of infrastructure maintenance does not necessarily equal the rate of infrastructure consumption.

How is using the already needed repair of infrastructure as a spring board to mend a broken economy any different then fixing infrastructure normally?

...because you're dissociating society by emphasizing industry without relationships. It destroys the psychological motive to remain honest and productive.

Or the manager of the project is the government, who doesn't need to make a profit.

This is extremely naive since the government always operates on a profit. Not only does it collect taxes merely behind the threat of force and get away with running deficits in handing out paychecks to bureaucrats, but even culturally speaking, the political process itself demands that people skew their lifestyles in a certain direction and schedule of infrastructure construction and maintenance merely out of appeals to authority.

Again, you're emphasizing industry without relationships. Maybe the economy recovers, but at this point, you've made it a moot point.

The only reason to give people jobs, then, would be to deter civil unrest/consciousness. Give them some project to waste their time on, and give them money to spend on more stuff to waste their time on. Let the establishment fuck its brains out and make as many babies as possible, and then tell those babies to go fuck themselves.

Of course, you could support abortion along with it, but we all know where that's heading.

[Wolfman]

The rate of infrastructure maintenance does not necessarily equal the rate of infrastructure consumption.

OK?

...because you're dissociating society by emphasizing industry without relationships. It destroys the psychological motive to remain honest and productive

Going back to your pseudo-primitivist position, I see?

This is extremely naive since the government always operates on a profit.

Strangely, Libertarians almost always take the opposite position

[Daktoria]

Profit is not necessarily something termed in currency, Wolf.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attention_economy

Just because the government's expenses>revenues doesn't mean it isn't sapping its people of time, energy, focus, and relaxation.

[Wolfman]

I'll take that a yes.

[southernmissouri2007]

Is this a Keynesian idea or has this idea been around before Keynes ?

President Obama’s $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — “the stimulus” — originally offered nearly $400 billion for infrastructure projects until the republithugs threw another tantrum and hijacked $260 billion of it for tax cuts. That’s one third of the entire stimulus package. No wonder it hasn’t worked as well as it could have. Now they’re whining that the stimulus didn’t create enough jobs. Well, duh. That’s because tax cuts don’t create jobs. Only consumer demand for products and services does that.


Those things are new and repaired roads, bridges, dams, harbors, levees, tunnels, buildings, schools, parking garages, subways, railways, parks, sewers, stadiums, airports, and other public facilities. That spending creates jobs for construction companies and workers. Those projects create demand for the supplies, equipment, tools, and other materials that they need for those projects. It creates demand for the trucking companies to ship them and the warehouses to store them. That creates jobs in all of those industries. If the companies supplying the construction industry have enough work, they can spend some of their revenue to hire more employees or to upgrade their own facilities. See, more demand, more jobs.

Then all of those workers have paychecks that they can spend on groceries, clothing, furniture, cars, houses, utilities, entertainment, appliances, restaurants, vacations, and all sorts of things. That creates demand in those industries. And that creates jobs. If those companies have enough work, they can spend some of their revenue to hire more employees or to upgrade their own facilities. See, more demand, more jobs. And government gets its new stuff built and its old stuff fixed. See. Everybody wins.

http://patomalley.wordpress.com/2011/06 ... e-economy/

[Daktoria]

Yes, it's been around since the dawn of time SM07.

A "job" is just something you do to stay busy in a world where you don't know how things happen.

A "paycheck" is just something you get to stay busy with when you're not doing your job.

"Infrastructure" is just something to help you stay busy with.

Think of it in terms of sex, masturbation, and porn if you have to. The government isn't going to make better porn if fuckers can masturbate good enough already. It's not even going to hire fuckers to make better porn if it comes at the cost of the government having sex.

Yea, you could argue an orgy makes everybody happier, but that doesn't do much good when you're arguing with someone who always wants to stay on top and is already there.

Public works projects are nice on paper, but socially and culturally speaking, they're only implemented when people get so frustrated or depressed that the government can't find a partner and has nothing better to do.

[Genghis Khan]

That’s because tax cuts don’t create jobs. Only consumer demand for products and services does that.

Yeah, but the tax cuts in the stimulus were important. First, because during a massive recession, the priority is not about collecting revenue, but to encourage consumer spending to stem the tide. Tax cuts, for people that actually use the excess funds right away to recirculate it back into the economy, is a tool that works.

Without it, the middle class has less money to spend, so consumer spending drops, which means businesses shed even more jobs because not enough customers are coming in to warrant the same number of employees.