How Many American Jobs Can The GOP Kill? (Hint: A Lot)
According to figures released this morning, the nation’s unemployment rate remains at a grim 9.1 percent. While the economy managed to add 117,000 net jobs in July (154,000 jobs were added in the private sector while another 37,000 government jobs were lost), Matt Yglesias correctly notes “that means we’re basically treading water” and “things are neither getting better nor worse.”
The GOP’s solution to mass unemployment: kill even more American jobs over the next 18 months.
Here’s a rundown of just a few of the GOP’s plans to destroy American jobs:
- 74,000+ jobs at risk at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and related construction projects continue to be at risk, with Rep. John Mica (R-FL), who we introduced you to earlier this week, once again hinting that the GOP will shut down the FAA later this fall if Democrats don’t give in to the GOP’s extreme anti-worker demands.
- 492,670 jobs at risk due to Mica’s slash-and-burn approach to transportation funding. The deep cuts Mica and House Republicans are pushing would cause thousands or even tens of thousands of jobs to be lost in each state, as well as allow our national infrastructure to continue to crumble even as China and other countries pour hundreds of billions of dollars into new infrastructure.
- 528,000 jobs at risk in 2012 due to the GOP’s stated unwillingness to extend long-term unemployment insurance for millions of jobless Americans. If the extended benefits are allowed to expire at the end of the year as the GOP wishes, unemployed Americans would only be entitled to a maximum of 26 weeks of unemployment benefits (and even fewer weeks in some states).
- 972,000 jobs at risk in 2012 unless the GOP allows sufficient new revenues to be included in the super committee deal in order to pay for it.
- 3,000,000 jobs at risk under a GOP plan to turn Medicaid into a block grant to the states, something that was included in the Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)-authored GOP budget plan and which the GOP is likely to try to resurrect during the super committee process this fall.
In One Sentence: We have an unemployment crisis and 62 percent of Americans say creating jobs — not cutting spending — must be the top priority going forward, but the GOP only wants more job-killing cuts in order to give more tax breaks for the wealthy and Big Oil.
Evening Brief: Important Stories That You May Have Missed
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Had federal, state, and local government payrolls remained at 2009 levels, the unemployment rate would be at 8.4 percent, not 9.1 percent.
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Is Defense Secretary Panetta really going to continue Gates’ legacy of resisting defense cuts?
What’s up with Heterosexual Pride Day?
Going to a single payer health care system would save a lot of money and cover everyone.
Why does the Washington Post employ an anti-Muslim blogger for “balance,” but not an Arab or Muslim blogger?
Tea Party Majority Leader Eric Cantor to the Unemployed: No More Unemployment Benefits For You
Yesterday, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) “put people on notice” that the GOP is going to be breaking promises and coming for your entitlements. Today, he upped the ante and told jobless Americans that we can’t simply can’t continue “pumping up” the unemployed with extended unemployment benefits.
Watch the video, via ThinkProgress:
Worth a Thousand Words: Fox Nation Celebrates President’s Birthday With a Racist Headline
Fox Nation has a long history of race-baiting, and they certainly didn’t disappoint on that score when it came to their report about the president’s 50th birthday party:
