The Explosion of Federal Government Jobs

[David Atlee]

From my blog www.theatleeappeal.com ;

There is just so much going on out there in the world of news it’s just tough to decide what to cover. The oil spill no doubt is almost on par with the immigration debate out in Arizona. The constant, unjustified attack of Goldman Sachs by Washington along with the financial reform bill are also big topics. These topics are so broad that it would take me a very long time to come up with a great discussion. Frankly, I’d rather drink a cold beer. But, I did come across a great story from Gallup. It outlined the differences between private sector employment and public sector employment. Let’s see what they had to say and why this should grab your attention.

First, let’s cover some of the stats that Gallup provided for us. Here is a quote explaining recent hiring in the private sector: ”The overall Index value for American workers in April tilts positive, with 27% of workers saying their places of employment are hiring, and 22% saying their employers are letting people go — resulting in an overall +5 Job Creation Index”. Now let’s take a look at what they had to say about federal employment numbers: ”By almost a 2-to-1 margin, federal employees say their employer is hiring rather than firing, giving the federal government a relatively robust +18 Job Creation Index for April”. So it’s blatantly obvious who’s growing faster. What are the significance of these numbers?

We all know that we’re “in the greatest recession since the Great Depression”. At least that’s what we’ve been told as many times as the dollar value of our national debt. So, if we are in a recession, how is it that government is growing so much? After all, it is the private sector that funds the public sector. Since Obama has taken office, real personal income for Americans has fallen 3.2% according to the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis. How much has government spending increased in that same time period? An article from the Wall Street Journal points out that Obama’s budget alone “more than doubles the national debt held by the public, adding more debt than all previous presidents — from George Washington to George W. Bush — combined.” Think about that for a minute.

As Japan proved to the world in the 1990s, you can’t spend yourself out of a recession. This is a crazy stat about that recession from the Ludwig von Mises Institute: “Overall during the 1990s, Japan tried 10 fiscal stimulus packages totaling more than 100 trillion yen, and each failed to cure the recession”. Apparently, the Obama administration hates history. But think about it folks. What are the major problems in a recession? Capital is scarce, unemployment is high, net worths vanish, economic activity is very slow. Then ask yourself this question. Since the private sector gets by on fumes in a recession, what sense does it make for the government to take MORE money out of a struggling economy? They have to if they are going to spend it on stimulus projects. It is nothing more than wealth redistribution. No new net wealth is created. Money is taken from people who earned it, and the government spends it where it thinks the money will be best served.

Remember what Obama promised us last year about his stimulus project? He said unemployment “would not go over 8%”. We heard teleprompter after teleprompter tell us that if he didn’t pass a stimulus that we would go from recession to depression in a matter of heartbeats. Well sir how wrong you were. Unemployment jumped over 10%. Add in his insane amount of government growth at the federal level and an overflow of temporary hires for the census and our unemployment number is now at 9.7%. Add in all of the previous spending projects since Obama has taken office plus his future plans of taking over the financial industry, cap and trade, our 2 wars oversees and it becomes overwhelming. It is completely unsustainable. It’s almost as if Obama is applying the Cold War tactic used against the Soviet Union on our own country. Spend, spend, spend, spend and then….. complete collapse. At the current rate we are heading, many economists are predicting that.

So rest easy everyone, knowing that we have a man in office who has no concept of fiscal responsibility. If you ever wanted to know what it would be like if a thief got a hold of your credit card information, you’ve got a great look at what would happen. It is truly uncanny. These November elections coming up could potentially be the most important elections in our lifetime. If we want to keep Obama from his drunken state of government expansion into economic collapse, we must shift the balance of power in Congress. Just as Rush Limbaugh stated, “I want Obama to fail.” If you want this economy to turn back around, you should too.