Reasons for unemployment...

Man you are really reaching on that one. I could just as easily said that this project put x number of people to work that other wise would not have been working if the funds were not approved and put that spin on it.

Nice fishing.

The point is, if you want to put people to work, put them to work. Not use the money to buy some machine (probably made in China) to put people out of work.

The whole idea of the "stimulus" was supposed to be to get people working, even if on the government dole. They used to employ dozens of people to do this work. Now with the stimulus they bought a machine and fired three fourths of the people.

And if the Fed Govt didn't give them the stimulas money for high speed rail, maybe all of them would be unemployed.right now. No new high speed rail, no need to lay new track.

Let's go with the assumption that the machine was made in China. Once it got to the US, didn't it have to be unloaded at a US port by workers? Didn't it have to be transported from the port to the destination, by workers? Once it got to the destination didn't it have to be unloaded and setup by workers? Didn't workers need to spend time being trained on how to use it, along with backup or extra shift workers? Or did the Chinese do all of that too?

Really, you can find fault with just about anything if you look hard enough

Maybe GM and Chrysler should shut down their assembly lines and go back to the pre Henry Ford ways of building autos, after all they took bailout money from DC so they could keep going and keep people employed. I bet they used some of that money to purchase some new robotics instead of hiring more people. Of course, if they did that their stock holders (probably mostly republicans) would not have a problem with that because screw the working guy if the bottom line looks good.

The issue with machinery and products made in China isn't about teamsters or stores. They make piddle compared to whoever manufactured it. That's the whole offshoring issue.

The issue with stimulus and technology is that the theory behind the stimulus was supposed to be paying people to work. The model was supposed to be the CCC/WPA/PWA stuff. Labor.

The reason companies use technology to eliminate labor is a bottom line reason. It fattens the pocketbook of the executives because they charge the same or more for the end product but pay less out in labor. The end result is fewer people employed to work.

It all ends up being a finger-pointing exercise anyway, since stimulus doesn't actually work to improve economies. But when the president is out making speeches saying that technology has killed jobs, and then his stimulus program is being used to buy technology to kill jobs...

To me, the only way stimulus money can be justified is in saying that if you're going to give people government handouts anyway (i.e. extended unemployment, welfare, etc.) you might as well get something in return for it in the form of roads, parks, buildings, or in this case railroads. Somehow that isn't what has happened.

The #1 reason for unemployment is that people don't have a job.

You are welcome.

The thing about the "stimulus" leading up to WWll is the amazing amount of infrastructure that was built.

It is hard to travel around in fly-over country without seeing a post office, school, park, bridge or courthouse that was built during that time frame.

Now it is repaving projects that are hardly awarded on need, and "green-jobs" that never come about.

The recent "stimulus" spending went for bureaucracies to run the stimulus funding process and was just a PR job to make it look like they were creating jobs.

They can't even come up with a respectable way to measure the jobs created or "saved".

It was all about the next election cycle, not about actually creating jobs or performing needed work.

Can't argue with that.

If we put these stimulus people to work instead of giving them money to load up on chips and soda...things might actually be better...instead of just pretending its better.

The reason for unemployment is that the Great Recession started with such a cataclysmic crash in '08 that investors, business leaders and the general public were terrified - and terrified people hoard money. That's a natural reaction, to save as much cash as you can and pay back as much debt as you can. So all non-mandatory spending went to zero, which reduced demand for products and services, which led to businesses refusing to hire in spite of record profits. That's a natural part of any recession, and the more dramatic the cause of the recession, the more dramatic the reaction. It'll take years - lots of years - for people to start believing in the American economy again, and until that happens, nobody can make unemployment go away.

It would be helpful for the government to put as many people to work as possible (on worthwhile projects), but the government can't hire the unemployment rate from 9 percent down to 6 percent. And of course when you have a recession that comes on the heels of a doubling of the national debt over an 8 year period and a starting budget deficit of 1.2 trillion/year, the government can't do very much that is going to move the needle.

One thing we should learn - the extreme capitalist economic model that has ruled the country since Reagan is a failure. It's time to understand that private enterprise can't initiate grand ideas like natural gas refueling stations from coast to coast and border to border, or fusion research, or new, small hydroelectric stations on every medium-sized dam in America, or upgrades to National Park facilities, or road repairs and expansion, or thousands of other ideas that are good for the country but, on pure economics, can't return a profit in a time period that private enterprise will allow. There are things that need doing that don't return a profit, and government needs to stop apologizing for doing them.

I voted for Reagan both times he ran, and voted for HW Bush, too, and even Bob Dole. But like all good ideas, reliance on private enterprise is only good until people take it too far, and it's time to recognize that it's gone way, way too far. When government has to try to find some kind of economic justification for doing its job - which is protecting the public welfare whether it's profitable or not - the Reagan legacy has gone to such an extreme that even Reagan would reject it if he was alive. It's time for our government to stop paying to rebuild other countries and start rebuilding ours, whether there's profit in it or not.