Everyone agrees the American job picture is a disaster. Unemployment estimates from June stretch from the official 9.5% to 16.5% to a sickening 22% by the most inclusive definition.
Economists, politicians and pundits debate the reasons. You're familiar with the arguments.
--Those on the right look at the $1.8 trillion of cash reserves held by American companies--and those are just the publicly traded ones-- and conclude that business has gone on a capital strike. Business is refusing to invest aggressively in the future, including hiring more people, in an atmosphere of rising taxes and regulations, not to mention overt rhetorical attacks on business by President Obama.
--Those on the left point to weak demand, overcapacity and banks that won't lend. Some, fearing deflation, argue for massive quantitative easing so as to force cash off the sidelines of corporate balance sheets and into the game of investment and hiring.
What's lost in these arguments about jobs, especially by those on the left, are the voices of the jobs' creators themselves. Those would be the employers. Let me repeat: In a national debate about jobs and job creation, hardly anyone is talking to job creators about jobs!
For example:
John Harwood, The New York Times, "Where Did the Jobs Go?"
Harwood: "[The question] which reclaims center stage in Washington this week, is this: Why is unemployment so high? The whodunit has flummoxed economists in both parties for a year. In 2009, as the new Obama administration grappled with the financial crisis, joblessness rose nearly two points beyond customary recession forecasts."
In 788 words, Harwood does not quote a single employer.
Paul Krugman, The New York Times, "The Problem for Business Isn't Obama"
Krugman: "All the buzz lately is that the Obama administration is "antibusiness." And there are widespread claims that fears about taxes, regulation and budget deficits are holding down business spending and blocking economic recovery. How much truth is there to these claims? None."
"None" also happens to be the number of employers quoted in Krugman's piece.
Barbara Kiviat, Time, "The Uncertainty Excuse Needs to Come to an End"
Kiviat: "Maybe it's time to stop blaming the government for the state of the economy and job creation. Maybe, instead, it's time for business leaders to--ahem--lead and make some decisions about the futures of their companies."
Kiviat talked to no employers for her piece. She does briefly quote GE Chief Executive Jeff Immelt, from a CNBC interview.
Daniel Gross, Slate, "Poor Little CEOs"
Gross: "The notion of these guys [e.g, employers, as represented by the Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Businesses] holding a jobs summit is a little like BP holding a deepwater drilling safety summit. ... The CEO class exhibits an unseemly combination of myopia and ingratitude."
Gross hacks away at straw CEOs throughout his 718-word piece. What he can't be bothered to do is actually talk to one.
I understand the left's reluctance to talk to employers directly. Talking to employers about jobs, and lack thereof, would wreck the left's narrative. What do you hear when you listen to employers? You hear stories like this one, from the comments section of a recent Mort Zuckerman piece:
I am a building designer, used to have employees and wanted to grow my firm to about 8 people. No longer. I will be more likely semi-retired by choice from this point on because:
Cost of Employees way up: Workman's Comp, Unemployment insurance, Health Care is up by nearly $ 8 per hour over 3 years. Health care alone now costs $4 an hour if they are young, over $5 per hour if over 50.
Business Regulation - every purchase over $ 600 needs a 1099 form, meaning I have to get the address and the tax ID of the power company, the insurance company, Office Depot, etc. I will be going from 4 1099's to over 100.
Health Care - I will now have to track where my employees go in the event of HazMat exposure. Did the government office they measured in for a few days contain lead or asbestos. Duh - yes, but it is supposedly safe for government employees why not mine.
Security - I must have lots more records on my employees keyed to their SS#, but if somehow I lose my laptop I am a crook.
I could go on and on, but my reward is:
My marginal tax rate jumps in 2011, about 30% more than before.
the FICA income limit keeps rising, that is 15% of net for the self employed on the marginal increase.
It is obvious that there will be a lot more taxes coming. So my risk is way up, but the government now TAKES over half of any marginal increase. I would rather fish.
Multiply "I would rather fish" by a few hundred thousand small business owners and you get a jobs crisis. You get 9.5%, 16.5% or even 22% unemployment when the models say it should be 8% at this point in the rocky recovery.
The forgotten man in this crisis is the employer. We forget him at our danger.
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