April 09, 2011
Has anyone told the White House press corps about the economic downturn? We have 8.8 percent [thanks Tony] of the workforce unemployed, more than 8 million people employed part-time who would like full-time jobs, and millions more who have given up looking for work altogether.
The reason is simple: there is not enough demand in the economy. When we cut government spending, there is less demand in the economy. As we used to say in intro econ class: Y = C+I+G+X-M. That means that GDP is equal to the sum of consumption, investment, government spending and net exports. If we cut government spending, then we have reduced demand, unless we think there are a lot of firms who will be inspired to hire people because the government is cutting back its spending.
Moody’s estimated that the original Republican plan for $61 billion in cuts would lead to a loss of 700,000 jobs. Goldman Sachs had a similar number. Since the final deal had a bit less than two-thirds of these cuts, the implication is that somewhat more than 400,000 workers will lose their jobs.
And the remarkable part of the story is that these newly unemployed workers are not even mentioned in the coverage in the NYT, the Post, or it seems anywhere else. Hey why ruin a great budget drama by talking about the people who will have their lives ruined?
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