More on Obama's "New WPA"
Two weeks ago I wrote the following regarding the sort of jobs that would be “created” (i.e., redistributed) under the Obama infrastructure stimulus package:
Stimulating the economy by building infrastructure projects may have made sense in the 1930s when the work force consisted almost exclusively of healthy adult males (white, of course, but that’s another blogpost).
How, I wonder, will an all-Democratic government deal with lawsuits claiming that a “new WPA” violates Title VII, the Americans With Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, the Age Discrimination Act of 1975, etc., etc., etc.
Fast forward to today:
Mr. Obama compared his infrastructure plan to the Eisenhower-era construction of the Interstate System of highways. It brings back the Eisenhower era in a less appealing way as well: there are almost no women on this road to recovery.
Back before the feminist revolution brought women into the workplace in unprecedented numbers, this would have been more understandable. But today, women constitute about 46 percent of the labor force. And as the current downturn has worsened, their traditionally lower unemployment rate has actually risen just as fast as men’s. A just economic stimulus plan must include jobs in fields like social work and teaching, where large numbers of women work.
The bulk of the stimulus program will provide jobs for men, because building projects generate jobs in construction, where women make up only 9 percent of the work force.
Mark my words: This issue will not go away. Given the Democratic Party’s structure as a mosaic of factional special interests, each of those interests will find something to grumble about. And perhaps, claiming discrimination, even sue over. And the only resolution even remotely tolerable to a liberal Congress and president will be to expand the boondoggle program beyond “vital infrastructure” so that there is something for everyone. Even if the final version turns out not to be so “vital” after all.
Just you wait.
Previously:
–On the Calls for an Infrastructure Stimulus
–Rohatyn’s Big Ditch
Filed under: Politics, Rent-Seeking, Taxation & Fiscal Policy, Updates