Jobs, jobs, jobs

So I heard on NPR Marketplace last night that we recently celebrated the second anniversary of the beginning of the recent "economic recovery". Indeed, the economy is doing remarkably well... if you're a major corporate executive or financier. For the rest of us mere mortals, it's been a different story. The "official" unemployment rate is hovering in the range of 9% or so, but the actual rate is much higher. The official statistics don't count discouraged workers who have stopped looking for work, and "underemployed" individuals (part-time workers who would like to be full-time, or workers whose jobs do not match their skill level).

So, what will it take to make jobs happen? The captains of industry say, "Cut taxes! Let us keep more so we can use it to put people to work!"

Bullshit.

I own a small business. So far, I have created one job (not counting me). If my taxes were slashed to zero, I would not create any more jobs. Heck, if I were to receive a billion-dollar bailout on top of my zero tax rate I would STILL not create any more jobs.

There is only one thing that will cause me to create more jobs: DEMAND. When I reach the point where I have more work than my current staff can handle, THEN and only then will I think about hiring.

This holds true in the rest of the economy. Tax cuts don't create jobs. Bailouts don't create jobs. Deregulation does not create jobs. The only thing that creates jobs is DEMAND. And demand by and large does not come from the top 1% who have hoarded all the cookies for themselves; it comes from the masses spending their hard-earned dollars.

Ever since Reagan, politicians, economists, and corporate executives have been preaching the gospel of "Supply-side" economics, also called "trickle-down". Infuse capital at the top of the economic food chain, they say, and the benefits will trickle down to the masses.

Again, bullshit. Experience has shown that capital does NOT trickle down, it bubbles up. It's estimated that thanks to the economic recovery, corporations are sitting on upwards of $2 TRILLION in cash. Just sitting on it, or in some cases playing financial games with it (stock buybacks and the like). It's not trickling ANYWHERE, least of all down to the masses.

So this is the landscape. Anybody have any answers? (I have my own ideas, but I'd like to hear what others have to say...)