I want to talk about the American Recovery and Investment Act of 2009.
In my travels I came across this project in Pismo Beach, California
Ok so let me start by saying that I am all for improvements for local municipalities. It is really nice to see improvements that are about safety and are visually and ergonomically pleasing.
However I do not want these improvements to be paid for by federal tax payer dollars. This project being built is using money from a tax payer in Detroit, Michigan or Beloit, Wis or what ever other town or city that federal tax payer dollars come from. I want local projects to come from either local county, city tax payer dollars or local bond measures.
Ok so why federal tax payer dollars and not local taxes or bonds? Well as you know California just like so many other states is broke. We have a liberal government that has run this state for years that believes in high taxes, and very strict EPA restrictions. In other words California is not necessarily business friendly. As our economy fails in California so does the tax base from which projects like this are funded locally. To make matters worse the state of California’s credit rating is very very poor.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/money_co/2009/02/california-cred.html
So what does this mean? Well if California’s credit rating is bad then investing in any local or municipal bonds would be a very bad investment. Why? There is not enough tax revenue to pay back the bond to the bond holders.
Why is there not enough tax revenue? Because there is high unemployment, upwards of 12.3%
http://www.edd.ca.gov/About_EDD/pdf/urate201007.pdf
OK so you read this and say, Well the EDD says the number of unemployed is down, Isn’t that good? Well no. The problem is that the EDD can only count the people that are actively collecting unemployment. The EDD cannot count the people that have dropped from the EDD system and have given up on looking for a job. So the real unemployment rate is more like 15-18%. If you count those that have dropped out from the system.
Ok so where am I going with this?
Did this grant money from the ARRA create jobs. Yes it did. It created temporary union construction jobs that will end when this project is done.
Did the grant money create any full time sustainable jobs? Sort of.
Notice in the plans above there are no provisions for any private owned businesses on the pier. Bait Shop, Restaurant, Souvenir Shop etc. Something that will employ people and generate sales tax income for the city of Pismo Beach.
So what jobs did this create? Well someone has to maintain this facility, paint, bathroom cleaning etc. So maybe it will create a few CITY GOVERNMENT jobs to be paid with either state, county or city taxes to maintain this facility. But where is that money going to come from? Another hand out from the federal government?
There is always the possibility that the City of Pismo Beach could hire an outside contractor to maintain this facility. That would create jobs in the private sector……but that maintenance contractor would still have to be paid with local or state taxpayer dollars.
If there was an outside contractor hired to do the maintenance on this new facility, how would they get the contract? How much would they charge and who is the contractor? Will this be another SEIU involved organization that will continue to rape and pillage the local and state governments? Is there any Nepotism involved here?
Why would I even think of Nepotism? LOL I was born and raised in Chicago and I have been surrounded by corrupt, usually Democratic politics my who life and now we have it running rampant in Washington DC.
Again I love the idea of new and improved public facilities funded by local tax dollars. I just have to ask the person that is reading this that lives in Bridgeport, Connecticut how are they going to enjoy the fruits of their federal tax payer dollars being spent in Pismo Beach, CA?
ST Marie
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