I agree with you, but would like to point to another factor which may be a more potent force against job creation, and that is the lack of credit in the Fall of 2008, which has persisted until the present.
We probably all agree that most job creation is done best by small business, well small businesses are dying for credit. Like home owners, the value of any assets held in a business have fallen drastically. If you have cash you can get a bank loan, but of course you don’t need it. If you have commercial real estate forget it. Plant and equipment are worth auction values at best. Even receivables are now discounted heavily. You have a business plan with a strong cash flow projection, file it because no one will lend you anything on paper projections.
What happened in 2008 was the severest small business credit crunch I have ever seen, and it hasn’t gotten better.
I had a small business with sales of $70mm a year and 160 union employees. Yes $70mm is a small business these days. We couldn’t get ~ $1mm from our bank in September 2008 and were forced by them into liquidation. Someone bought the business with cash for $2.5mm and now runs it with half the workers making half what we paid and no benefits.
We got no bail out, and frankly, although I would have taken it, we shouldn’t have. That’s how it works.
Until a small business starting or growing can get credit, the jobs numbers won’t come back. With the government borrowing and spending for benefits the country can’t afford, there is no cofidence or money to lend.
P.S. I still haven’t figured out why the financial world stopped back in 2008, but it sure killed a lot of us.
If you want to attempt to figure it out you may start here for a little background.
Secret "closed door" meeting with Congress (3/14/08)
Not only did members discuss new surveillance provisions as was the publicly stated reason for the closed door session, they also discussed:
1. the imminent collapse of the U.S. economy to occur by September 2008,
2. the imminent collapse of US federal government finances by February 2009,
3. the possibility of Civil War inside the USA as a result of the collapse
Congressional Democrats Bankrupted the Nation
Canada Free Press ^ | Wednesday, January 28, 2009 | JB Williams
MUST READ THREAD!!! (especially #6, 16, 24, 41, 68, 80, 86)
9/11/2008 CATASTROPHIC FINANCIAL TERRORIST ATTACK CAUSED ECONOMIC MELTDOWN
Atlas Shrugs ^ | 2/12/09 | Pamela Gellar
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2184661/posts
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2009/02/9112008-catastrophic-financial-terrorist-attack-caused-economic-meltdown.html
Who Attacked Our Economy? Why Does No One Care?
Townhall ^ | February 12, 2009 | Diana West
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2184786/posts
Bush’s $350 Billion TARP is About to Break Even
by Gregory Hilton, March 27, 2010.
[So what happened to the $29 Billion earned from the TARP pay back?]
Was the Bush TARP Program a Mistake?
by Gregory Hilton, March 28, 2010