by Mark Gruenberg for PAI

            Even the Obama administration, in the person of Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, seems to be at a loss for answers when the millions of unemployed ask if they can have jobs now -- with emphasis on the word “now.”

            That’s the conclusion we draw from the wording of the question and of Solis’ response when she unveiled the proposed Labor Department budget for fiscal 2011, which starts Oct. 1.

            At a time of 10% unemployment and 15.3 million jobless -- with millions more underemployed -- the question of how to help those workers get back on their feet, right now, is more than academic.

            That’s because no work equals no money equals no purchases of goods and services equals no work for other employees who produce those goods and services.  And on and on it goes, in an ever-increasingly deadly spiral of joblessness and despair.

            So through all the forums and sessions and calls for “jobs now,” that have been held inWashington since October, Press Associates has put the practical question of how to achieve that to policymakers, academics and anyone else we could corral.   

            Most of the answers have fallen back on temporary aid -- extended jobless benefits, expanded food stamps, subsidies for health coverage for workers who lost their jobs to imports, etc.   Some of the answers we’ve gotten have been variations of Homer Simpson’s “Doh.”

            Here’s the question, as we put it to Secretary Solis during her web chat, via e-mail, on the budget, and her answer.  You judge:

      Press Associates’ question: “The department is aiding the unemployed through extended jobless benefits, one-stop career centers and other initiatives to tide people over.  But what do you say to a worker who says to you: ‘I'm qualified, I'm ready, I'm willing, I'm able.  I want a job TOMORROW. What are you doing for me to ensure I get a job TOMORROW?’  We all know people like that.” (Capitalization was in the original.)   

            Solis’ reply: “Our competitive grants funded under the recovery act have provided over 25,000 training slots.  The partnerships represent impressive labor-management partnerships in emerging green industries that could offer workers the immediate skills they need to fill vacancies in turbine and solar panel manufacturing, bio-fuel development, and high-tech manufacturing.  Based upon the interest conveyed by our partners, we are extremely hopeful that these partnerships will result in immediate job creation.”   (The recovery act is the official name of last year’s stimulus law.)

            Pardon the cynicism, but the key words in her answer are “could” and “hopeful.”

            The Obama administration needs to do better than that.  So here’s a suggestion to the president: Call up your fellow Illinoisan, Democratic Rep. Phil Hare of Rockford, a former union shop steward, and ask him about his legislation re-creating FDR’s Works Progress Administration.  Remember, one-quarter of the country was jobless then.

            Roosevelt put the jobless to work virtually immediately, Mr. President and Ms.  Labor Secretary.  The jobless spent their time -- and got paid -- for fixing up infra-structure, building things, planting trees, doing surveys, writing guidebooks, painting our public buildings, even documenting our history.  Why can’t you try the same thing?  ###