And this surprises us because?

We are facing high unemployment, which has sapped public budgets and led to major public-sector layoffs — and we are surprised when the thousands of public workers now out of work are slowing the economic recovery.

Economists at Rutgers University say losses in public jobs are, in part, slowing the Garden State’s economic comeback.

The findings will be released today during the Rutgers Economic Advisory Service forecast and conference in New Brunswick.

The study finds New Jersey has lost 269,000 jobs since January 2008. About 45,000 alone disappeared from May through September.

Economics Advisory Service director Nancy Mantell says New Jersey has lost 42,400 public sector jobs since May. More than half came from local governments.

It’s simple math: If you add more unemployed people to the mass of those already unemployed, you have more unemployed people — and that means there are fewer people who can buy houses, cars and other goods, making it less likely that businesses will be able to hire and so on. It is why many economists have pushed public spending — direct aid to workers, infrastructure projects, etc. — as the best approach to getting the economy moving in the right direction.

It appears, of course, that we are going to continue trying this other tack for a while, which means we shouldn’t expect an economic rebirth any time soon.

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Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie.

2 thoughts on “And this surprises us because?”

  1. Wrong. Governments and politicians don't create jobs.People, entrepreneurs, companies, etc. do.Spending money that we don't have will ultimately bring us down to a third world nation.

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  2. Wrong, wrong to the libertarian anonymous dude. Government can damn well create jobs. Ever heard of the GI Bill, the NIH or NASA. Government has indeed created jobs or supplied the means so that ordinary Americans could create jobs. The GI Bill was an investment in America and it paid off many fold to the enrichment of this country in spiritual and material ways. Following the right wing/libertarian ideology will lead us to becoming a third world nation. Eight years of the GOP and Bush gave us the biggest deficits ever, two wars and the GREAT RECESSION. Right wingers want Obama to be more like Herbert Hoover, we all know how well Hooverism worked out.

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