Readers Respond: The Obama jobs plan

The absence of housing initiatives was just one criticism we heard from readers regarding President Obama's $47 billion jobs plan:

"Washington, D.C., has the cart before the horse. There has to be DEMAND for products before businesses can hire people. Housing is the best category to jump-start more businesses throughout the USA. Housing drives our economy in so many ways. However, if housing affordability is not in line with consumer income, savings and trust in the future, there will be no job creation on a scale that will bring us back to prosperity, let alone out of recessionary thinking.

“It is increasingly apparent that the President and Congress (as well as the banking system) have little clue regarding the day-to-day running of a business. It also seems lacking in the knowledge of U.S. citizens’ needs. We are ‘voters’ to the politicians running our government, instead of ‘their employers.’ "

— Jim Schweiger

“I don’t feel [the jobs plan] will do any real good because it focuses on a microcosm of the overall economy.  This small group that will benefit coincidently has a major union presence (Operating Engineers Union).  The housing construction industry does not have this presence.  Also, the housing industry consists of many small ‘mom and pop’ companies. It’s not like the Roosevelt ‘New Deal’ era when such infrastructure projects were largely manual labor and thus created tens of thousands of jobs. With our current technologies, they will only employ a couple of thousand -- not nearly enough to make a dent in the problem.”

— Kent Pearson

"Housing will lead us out of this mess, if we support it."

— George Pattee

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