Gov. Walker, Where Are the Jobs You Promised?

One question: Nearly 10 months after Gov. Scott Walker was inaugurated into office with promises of 250,000 new jobs coming to Wisconsin; where are the jobs?

His term started with bold draconian moves rationalized on the concept that we must balance the state budget and cut the fat beginning with increasing public employees’ contributions to their pension and healthcare benefits. In addition, he cut the state shared revenue to education, froze property tax increases for two years and limited public employee unions’ ability to collective bargain to only wage increases to cover cost of living increases. In addition, cuts have been made to entitlements and government funds shifted to support “Wisconsin’s Open for Business” program. OK, the governor has been pretty much given everything that he said we needed to turn around Wisconsin’s economy; but “where are the jobs?"

The theory for cutting the government revenues was that it would free up money so that employers would invest the savings into creating more jobs. Also, by making Wisconsin a more business-friendly state, business would move into the state to take advantage of our business-friendly environment. In theory, the increase in jobs would generate revenue to the state in an increase in state personal income taxes and sales tax revenues. Without the jobs, the theory remains just that, a theory.

The governor is beginning to receive questions as to why we aren’t creating the jobs he promised. He has been responding that it is out of his control and it is a result of the Obama administration’s policies and Washington’s inability to generate policies that will turn the economy around without creating greater national debt. Coming out of the Republican controlled legislature is the argument that we haven’t deregulated state regulations enough to attract business investment. Therefore, let’s deregulate and it will surely make Wisconsin attractive enough for business. Throw into the mix the idea that we need to reduce state capital gains taxes to put more into the pockets of investors and this will finally make the difference in creating more jobs.

But yet, there is another reason why we aren’t filling jobs when they are going wanting as stated by state business leaders. Recently, the governor came out stating that there were over 30,000 jobs that weren’t getting filled. However, when digging a little deeper, it turns out that over 6,000 of the jobs were in neighboring states. Even so, why are 25,000 jobs going unfilled? The excuse now is that we don’t have an available workforce with the right skill sets. This is what business leaders are using as an excuse for not hiring. Now we have come to the question on everyone’s lips; can the governor fulfill his promises of job creation?

It is highly doubtful that after all the machinations that the state has endured over the last 10 months that anything fruitful will come of it. Anyone that understands basic economics will tell you that production and jobs is directly dependent on consumption. Not only has state consumption refused to grow, but the Walker plan has removed $150 million out of the hands of the public sector employees decreasing consumption even more.

One can only conclude that the state has been ripped apart politically, not for economic gain or progress, but for pure political gain and positioning. The question still stands; Gov. Walker where are the jobs, we can’t wait.