Creating Jobs: No Shortage of Ideas How To Do It

Aug. 11, 2011 -- The U.S. may have a job shortage; but there's no shortage of ideas, now, for how to create more jobs. With 25 million people looking for work and the unemployment rate stuck at 9.1 percent, the economy can't recover until the job engine is restarted.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this week that there were only 3.1 million job openings in June. The number is far below the number at the beginning of the recession (4.4 million in December 2007) and has been flat since February 2011.

President Obama devoted a weekend address to the need to reduce unemployment. Jobs, too, will remain his topic today, when he travels to Holland, Mich. today to inspect a Johnson Controls plant making advanced batteries--an example, says the administration, of how jobs can be created by promoting green technology.

Though the president has said that deficit reduction must remain part of the country's economic strategy, he stressed in his weekend remarks that, "Our job right now has to be doing whatever we can to help folks find work; to help create the climate where a business can put up that job listing. We've got to rebuild this economy and the sense of security that middle class has felt slipping away for years."

Ideas the Obama administration has put forward include a new tax credit that would give companies a financial incentive to hire veterans returning from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; passage of free trade agreements now pending, which the president says would create jobs by boosting U.S. exports to Asia and South America; and putting unemployed construction workers back to work rebuilding America's roads, bridges, airports and other crumbling infrastructure.

These ideas represent a small fraction of job-creation schemes now circulating, some put forth by think-tanks and advocacy groups, other by unions as well as by politicians of both parties. Seemingly small steps, say advocates, could yield significant job increases.