Rep. Gary Miller and his Conservative Majority in the House of Representatives like to say they are focusing on job creation, but in reality they are focusing on the deficit. They don't want to focus on really fixing the unemployment problem because it creates a way to bludgeon President Obama every Friday when the Unemployment numbers come out.
The deficit is a medium term problem that will require some reforms in the way that we spend and consume health care resources. However, the immediate problem is unemployment and I don't think the same Conservative equation, trickle down economics, will be the solution to our unemployment problems or if they are serious in solving this problem.
Trickle down in its simplest form is this: Hand money to the wealthy (aka the Job Creators) and the benefits will flow downward to the many. This is done mostly by cutting taxes for the wealthy and providing tax deductions that benefit the percentage of members that make up that income slice.
Trickle Down is a 20th Century Solution to a 21st Century Problem. These are the problems we face in this Century:
Automation
According to Wikipedia, Automation is the use of machines, control systems, and information technologies to optimize productivity in the production of goods and delivery of services. Automation is good thing as far as efficiency is concerned. However, it is a creatively destructive force that displaces workers (which make up a large share of operating budgets). The method of how we deal with the problem of displacement is a question that needs to be answered.
Globalization
Globalization is the process of producing goods and providing services in places that can do these things more cheaply. The US manufacturing industry was decimated by globalization because it was used as an excuse to ship jobs to China, Mexico, or other non-unionized places where workers were paid a fraction of the costs. Again American workers were displaced and no process was in place to deal with that situation.
In addition, Globalization was one of the factors that contributed to the enlarging of the Banks making them Too Big Too Fail. The Internationalization of Finance nearly brought the world to knees during the Great Recession. To date no Financial Industry Executive has been brought to justice because of the fraud that they committed.
Income Inequality
Income Inequality is a stagnation of wealth that creates a bifurcated society in which more and more share of the nation's income goes to a smaller and smaller percentage of the population. This eventually creates political instability by radicalizing those who want to do well but don't have the resources to do so.
In conclusion, all I've seen from Rep. Gary Miller is mere platitudes and little in concrete action. He does not represent the interests of the 31st Congressional District, when it comes to creating jobs of the future. He is looking at 20th Century solutions to 21st Century problems.
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