Re: [A-List] Re: [gang8] Unemployment and Tax Cut

["j.schukte.baeuminghaus" <cresscourt@xxxxxxxxx>]

Kevin,

You say -


Moreover, job creation programmes tend to create jobs we do not
> need, while neglecting work that needs doing.

That is right of course: it is much better to create jobs that do the things
we want done; but we should not be too determinedly the perfectionist.
If I may take a controversial example, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)
of the EU seemed a wrong construct to many - and indeed still does. But it
has kept the agricultural sector in the EU going, it has preserved rural
communities which might otherwise have withered and indeed it has, from time
to time, been the "glue" that has held the EU itself together. Many other
than farmers have benefitted from it - so many that, despite its apparently
massive faults, including costs, it is likely to survive even the addition
of 10 or more new countries to the EU next year and after.
One must ask whether, if we had not seen the CAP constructed in 1963, we
would ever see it constructed now.
Attitudes have changed dramatically in the meantime. The public intervention
in the economy, the massive costs, etc are now out of sync with conventional
wisdom.
But is conventional wisdom in this respect wise?
The role of government - of public enterprise - in the economy - in what I
still like to think of as a MIXED economy - needs fundamental reassessment
and we might be reaching a point where that reassessment will simply have to
be made.
Public enterprise and investment are an essential accompaniment to efficient
and profitable and growing private investment.
Both public and private fixed-capital investment are essential to rising
productivity and production - to full employment and real, continuing
economic growth as well as social stability and strength.
Yes, we should have job-creation programmes that do what needs doing; but,
to quote - and violate - Shakespeare, "in striving to do the best, we should
not turn our backs on what could nevertheless be very good."



James Cumes
http://VictoryOverWant.org
http://www.crystaldreamspub.com/bios/authors/A-E/cumes_j.htm

----------
>From: "Henry C.K. Liu" <hliu@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>To: a-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>Cc: gang8@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx,  TheNewForum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx,  pkt@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>Subject: Re: [A-List] Re: [gang8] Unemployment and Tax Cut
>Date: Fri, May 16, 2003, 5:49 pm
>

> Moreover, job creation programmes tend to create jobs we do not
>> need, while neglecting work that needs doing.