Make the Tough Call on Extending Unemployment

Many people in our nation are unemployed as a result of the liberal policies of Obama and Bush, of Democrats and liberal Republicans, who didn't respect private property rights, who created barriers and limits to our freedom and liberty, and who failed to embrace and love human life in all of its glory. These liberal policies manifested itself in high taxes, cumbersome regulations disguised as 'safety' or 'environmental', new entitlements, increased federal control over disaster relief and education and energy production, increases in barriers to production and investment, and the giving away of taxpayer money that the government doesn't even have to those who haven't earned it.

Unemployment is difficult, and it doesn't look like the situation is going to get a whole lot better, especially if Obama and the Democrats don't extend the Bush tax cuts. In order for jobs to be created though, you have to allow people to make free choices, and what is happening right now with unemployment benefits is not right. The government is using money taken from my children and from my grandchildren (ie, debt) to pay people to sit home and not work. It isn't paying these people enough to really pay the bills or buy any new products (so it isn't 'stimulus payments') and these unemployment benefits can only be earned when people aren't working, so they aren't producing anything for our society. At some point, unemployment benefits must be scaled back or cut off, or else unemployment will simply turn into yet another entitlement program, paid for by debt, acting as a drag on our economy and preventing jobs from being created.

Tough choices have to be made at some point by unemployed- to either get retrained, to switch careers, to retire early at a reduced standard of living, to get a job at a retail chain or fast food joint, or to take a risk on themselves and go into business as an entrepreneur. Of course unemployment is a safety net that people do pay into, and thus should be there for those to cushion their fall and buy them time to recover and readjust, but unemployment should not be a long-term solution, or else it will be come a long-term problem.

That being said, our elected leaders (mainly Democrats in Congress and the Presidency but also some Republicans) are unable to make the tough decisions that need to made regarding unemployment. There are increased calls to extend these benefits, indefinitely I imagine, by many in the media. Via RealClearPolitics, Robert Reich (whose book The Work of Nations: Preparing Ourselves for 21st Century Capitalism was required reading in two of my University classes) is one of these types of people who are unable to make the hard decisions to get American back to work, and writes in the San Francisco Chronicle "Extend benefits for jobless, not tax cuts for rich":

Yet Republicans and some Blue Dog Democrats in Congress say we can't afford another extension of jobless benefits. The deficit is too big.But wait. These are the same members of Congress who say we should extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. Extending the Bush tax cuts for the people at the top would cost more than extending unemployment benefits for struggling families without a breadwinner. These families need the money. The rich don't.

This Reich is the same person who advises Democrats on economic policy, and he thinks that in the zero-sum game of wealth creation, it is better to take money from jobs creators (ie, the wealthy, those people who worked hard for their money, who invest in businesses, who buy products, and who run businesses) and transfer that money (through government bureaucrats, who take a large cut for themselves) to those who are unemployed, so that they can continue to not produce anything and drain wealth from society. Reich is proud of the 'tough decision' that he is making and thinks that it is 'really brave' for politicians to take money by force and give it to someone else for doing nothing (being unemployed) and then take credit for it. Reich ends his editorial by saying:

Quick action is needed. About 800,000 unemployed workers will run out of benefits this week. Two million more will stop receiving benefits by the end of December. Millions more after that. The choice couldn't be clearer.

The choice is clear- make the tough decision Congress and do something different than creating another entitlement program. Perhaps it is some sort of reduced unemployment program, designed to transition people off government dependence to independence and freedom, or perhaps it is some sort of unemployment program that rewards people for getting back to work in any way rather than bribing them to stay in government-induced dependent poverty, but the choice is clear- do not just simply make the easy call and extend benefits, but instead make the tough call and move people closer to freedom while increasing protection of private property.