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For people without a job, give a guaranteed government job for $6 an hour. This sounds good but in practice would probably be a bad idea, for multiple reasons.

For people without a job, give a guaranteed government job for $6 an hour. This sounds good but in practice would probably be a bad idea, for multiple reasons. The main problem is that government work programs would (by necessity) have to involve jobs that almost anyone is capable of performing, with minimal oversight required. This would be very susceptible to gradually becoming pointless busy-work, variations on the "one person digs a hole, next person fills it back in" pattern. The net result would likely be money spent wasting people's time to do work that creates no value. The ideal goal is to get people into jobs where they're actually creating value, and spending time doing a useless "job" is actually counterproductive because it's time they can't be spending to gain skills or look for other work. We'd be better off paying people $6/hr to get training in a marketable skill, or to search for work matching skills they already have.

bokonist 17y ago
Of course it would be make work jobs. But the pay is aimed to be lower than ~98% of the jobs out there. Even McDonald's pays more than $6 an hour. The idea is that this would be a job of last resort. A way for people who can't even hold down a job at McDonald's to at least learn what it means to work. The other point is that it allows people who can't hold down normal jobs not to starve, will not giving them an incentive to go on welfare just because they would rather not work at all. We'd be better off paying people $6/hr to get training in a marketable skill, or to search for work matching skills they already have. Government job training programs have a long history of not working at all. For entry level jobs, the best training is on the job. At a low level, the basic skills needed are: getting to work on time, being reliable, not dropping the f-bomb on your boss, etc. The point of a guaranteed job program is to be that very basic step into the workforce.
- netcan 17y ago
  You are arguing for a make-work equivalent of dole queues.

bokonist 17y ago

Of course it would be make work jobs. But the pay is aimed to be lower than ~98% of the jobs out there. Even McDonald's pays more than $6 an hour. The idea is that this would be a job of last resort. A way for people who can't even hold down a job at McDonald's to at least learn what it means to work. The other point is that it allows people who can't hold down normal jobs not to starve, will not giving them an incentive to go on welfare just because they would rather not work at all. We'd be better off paying people $6/hr to get training in a marketable skill, or to search for work matching skills they already have. Government job training programs have a long history of not working at all. For entry level jobs, the best training is on the job. At a low level, the basic skills needed are: getting to work on time, being reliable, not dropping the f-bomb on your boss, etc. The point of a guaranteed job program is to be that very basic step into the workforce.

netcan 17y ago
You are arguing for a make-work equivalent of dole queues.