Jobs, Housing and Stocks All Down; Could We Please Try Something Different?

I’m just not feeling that recovery yet.  Are you?  In today’s news, it’s being reported that 429,000 Americans filed first-time claims for unemployment benefits rose last week. (See Jobs Picture Grows Worse as Weekly Claims Post Jump - CNBC ).  Not only that, but the number of those filing for the first time the week before was revised upward, to 420,000.  The rolling weekly average for the last four weeks is 426,250.

I don’t pretend to be a math genius, but doesn’t this mean that, over the past month, over 1.7 million Americans filed new claims for unemployment? 

According to the same article, it was also announced that new home sales fell in May.

The article also notes that the Federal Reserve downgraded its assessment of our economic prospects for 2011, predicting that the unemployment rate “is likely to fall only slightly from last month’s 9.1 percent level by the end of 2011.”

Thanks to all this negative news, the stock market has been down all day today.

As someone who’s an integral part of these unhappy statistics, I have to ask, respectfully, if the people in charge of our government know or care about what they’re doing.  We’ve been told for a couple of years now that “jobs are our number one priority,” that the government is fixing a “laser-like focus” on the worsening job situation.  These people may mean well, but what have they got to show for their efforts?

Let me clarify one thing, though.  I don’t believe it’s the government’s job to create jobs.  I believe it’s the government’s job to minimize those things that government does – tax, spend, regulate – that, if done excessively, make it unfeasible for the private sector to create jobs and for economic growth to occur.

Does anyone think that the federal government is minimizing taxing, spending and regulation?  If profit-making businesses, which create jobs that enable us all to prosper, are viewed as inherently bad and untrustworthy and in need of being controlled if not punished, then why do government gurus act puzzled when their controlling, punishing policies don’t stimulate growth and job creation?

I’m just weary of hearing these people act surprised at the “unexpected” stagnation in our economy.  They’re so convinced of the correctness of their views that they continue to pursue the same ineffective policies, regardless of the lack of results.

It would restore my faith in government if, just once, these government officials would announce that they recognize that their policies aren’t working.  They would acknowledge that they need to do something different in a sincere effort to actually help the American people and then, they would actually do it, even if it doesn’t square with their own economic and/or political set of beliefs. 

What’s the harm in trying something else?  What have they got to lose by implementing a policy or policies that might actually have a positive effect on our current situation?

It really distresses me that politicians in general seem unable to tolerate even the thought of trying anything that's not in line with their particular political perspectives, even when the things that are, are obviously not working.

That’s when I think that they truly must not care what they’re doing.  They don’t seem to grasp that their policies are only prolonging the economic pain of millions and millions of real people; not just the unemployed, but our families too, including the businesses we can’t patronize and the purchases we can’t make. 

How can they not see that what they’re doing – we’ve given them more than a couple of years now, that’s long enough for them to know – isn’t helping?   

That’s when I get the feeling that I really am nothing more than a number, a statistic, to these people we've elected to represent us.  The unemployed are just collateral damage, unfortunate losers in an ideological tug-of-war.