Written by Brian Tumulty Gannett Washington bureau

N.Y. lawmakers’ federal jobs agenda lacks unified effort? Hardly the problem, NY Lawmakers’ ARE the problem. Over taxed and Over regulated, business and business makers have fled the State in record numbers

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20111226/NEWS01/112260325/N-Y-lawmakers-federal-jobs-agenda-lacks-unified-effort
WASHINGTON — Jobs and the economy are expected to be the top issues in the 2012 election, but New York’s congressional lawmakers have yet to make a unified bipartisan effort to reverse job losses in many parts of the state.
Two years after the Great Recession ended in December 2009, upstate regions and the northern suburbs of New York City are a long way from recouping the jobs they lost over the past decade.
Job growth in areas north of New York City has generally been slow or nonexistent.

In the two years between November 2009 and November 2011, the 55 counties north of New York City added only 29,200 jobs, according to an analysis by the Fiscal Policy Institute.

More than half of those gains — 16,500 — were in the Rochester area, while 5,800 were in the northern suburbs of Westchester, Rockland and Putnam counties. Employment in Binghamton fell by 700. Other cities such as Buffalo recorded small gains.
The 55 counties lost more than 100,000 jobs between January 2001 and January 2010, according to state labor force data.

Even worse, many of the new jobs have been in low-wage industries such as restaurants, educational services and home health care, according to the Fiscal Policy institute.

And the job losses were concentrated in higher-paid industries.

“We are trading jobs that are high-paying and (compete) in international markets for low-paying jobs that depend on a local market,” said Ken Pokalsky, senior director of government affairs at the New York State Business Council. “We are shedding good-paying jobs by the bushel load.”

The state’s highest-paying industry, finance and insurance, lost nearly 74,000 jobs between 2000 and 2010. The average 2010 wage in that sector was more than $194,000.

The high-paying information technology sector, with an average 2010 wage of more than $90,000, lost almost 73,000 jobs, while manufacturing lost almost 290,000 and construction lost more than 19,000. The average 2010 wage among New Yorkers in manufacturing topped $59,000. In construction, it topped $60,000.

“The best thing for New York would be to promote growth nationally,” Pokalsky said. [AND CUT TAXES AND OVER REGULATION!]

Interviews with both New York senators and 10 House members representing districts north of New York City found almost all agree on the need for federal infrastructure spending. [The State is BROKE! GET OUT OF THE PRIVATE SECTORS WAY AND JOBS WILL FLOOD BACK TO NYS!]

A federal transportation reauthorization bill is pending in Congress, but the Republican-controlled House and Democrat-controlled Senate disagree on how much to spend and how many years the reauthorization should run.
Democratic Rep. Brian Higgins of Buffalo supports a proposal by the liberal-leaning New America Foundation to spend $1.2 trillion on infrastructure over the next five years to jumpstart the economy and create an estimated 27 million jobs.
“Unless and until Congress recognizes the need to do a robust trillion-dollar infrastructure package, we will not create jobs to the extent that they are needed in this country,” Higgins said. “Roads and bridges — those jobs, they cannot be outsourced. Money has been cheaper than it has ever been before. You can borrow money [MY GOD HAVE YOU LEARNED NOTHING! THIS IS WHAT GOT US INTO THIS MESS!!!] at less than 2.5 percent. Labor’s cheap and equipment is cheap because it’s idling. These are public responsibilities.”

However, there’s a partisan divide among members of the delegation on the federal role in job creation. [NO MORE FEDERAL INTERFERENCE!]

The state’s senior U.S. senator, Democrat Charles Schumer, said the best hope for upstate job growth is House passage of his Senate-approved China currency bill. He said that would allow the U.S. to take action against Chinese imports based on the currency imbalance that gives Chinese products a price advantage. [SCHMUCKIE, WHO AUTHORIZED THE PREVIOUS BILL EH??? YOU! SO STFU!]

The bill had bipartisan support in the Senate, but a floor vote in the House has been blocked by GOP leaders. [GOOD!! KEEP OPPOSING BAD LEGISLATION!]

Schumer also supports the state’s effort to emphasize growth in industries already established in upstate cities, such as nanotechnology and computer chip manufacturing that Albany has emphasized.
“Every little bit helps and there’s not one road to Rome,” Schumer said.

In November, Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand unveiled a five-part plan — she calls it the Upstate Works Act — that would provide federal tax credits, loans and grants. [MORE MONEY WE DON’T HAVAE AND NEED TO BORROW FROM FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS!]

Freshman Republicans in the delegation have panned Gillibrand’s plan. They favor reducing the federal government’s role in economic policy.

“Various senators and representatives have been laboring mightily to see how the federal government can manage our lives better than we can,” said Rep. Nan Hayworth, R-Bedford, Westchester County. “That’s a fool’s errand, with all due respect.”

Freshman Republican Rep. Anne Marie Buerkle of Onondaga pointed to 20 bills passed by the House that, if passed by the Senate, would reduce federal regulations as a way to spur job creation.

Gillibrand’s plan focuses on federal assistance for manufacturing, agriculture, rural broadband and worker retraining.

The two-part manufacturing agenda would provide a $30 billion Manufacturing Revolving Loan Fund to help small- and medium-sized manufacturers expand or use clean energy, and would reauthorize the Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
Her plan also would offer a tax credit of up to $30,000 for farmers who purchase value-added equipment for packaging, cooking or other processing of crops, such as apple growers who want to make apple juice or apple cider.
Gillibrand wants the fiscal 2012 farm bill to reauthorize the Rural Utility Service’s rural broadband access loans and loan guarantee program through 2017. That program provided $12 million to New York in 2010.
And she supports training grants from the Labor Department to train workers for specific industries and for the state to help businesses and industry create regional skill alliances.
The last part of her plan would bring back the Build America Bonds program, which was part of the 2009 economic stimulus legislation and helped state and local governments issue infrastructure bonds. The program helped New York fund $19 billion in projects in 2009 and 2010. [All useless abuses of federal spending, the private sector can and DOES do a better job at all of this. [END THE MASSIVE TAXING AND OVER REGULATION OF FARMS AND RURAL COMMUNITIES AND BUSINESSES AND WE WILL BE JUST FRIGGIN’ FINE!!!!]

Gillibrand readily acknowledges the impetus for job growth must come from the private sector.

“The government doesn’t create jobs,” she said. “These small businesses and these manufacturers do. So it’s not like we can take credit for it, anyway.”

Nor does Gillibrand think her plan will be implemented in the next five years.
“It’s going to be a never-ending set of goals,” she said. “Because until we can get 100 percent rural broadband coverage in New York state, I’m going to keep fighting for funds to do it. Until we see a real resurgence in manufacturing in upstate New York, you’re going to keep fighting for funds to do it. So for each of these ideas, these are long-term goals.”
[THEN WHY ARE YOUPASSING DRACONIAN TAXING AND REGULATING TO FORCE BUSINESS AND FARMING TO FLEE THE STATE. GET OUT OF OUR BUSINESS AND LEAVE US ALONE! WE WILL BE JUST FINE THEN!]

Several delegation Democrats said they were not aware of all the details of Gillibrand’s plan.

“I am vaguely familiar with it,” said Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-Hurley. “I think that the plan is serious and it will be to some degree effective. It will be positive. There’s going to be an awful lot of different things that need to be done, different pieces of legislation.”
Rep. Nita Lowey, D-Harrison, Westchester County, said she agrees with Gillibrand on reviving the Build America Bonds program to help local governments with their infrastructure needs. But some Republicans see little value in the approach. [CLUELESS PROGRESSIVES!]

“The things you are referencing, to me are old-school political trickery,” Rep. Tom Reed, R-Corning, said after hearing a summary of Gillibrand’s plan. “It’s based off a sentiment that D.C. is the one that can somehow be the job creator for America. My philosophy is that small-business America and the private sector are the job creators for America. I’d be looking for energy development in upstate New York — natural gas, all the alternatives and renewable.”

Buerkle, Reed and other Republicans such as Reps. Chris Gibson of Kinderhook and Richard Hanna of Oneida County agree the federal government can assist job growth through spending on highways, bridges and other infrastructure projects.
“I view infrastructure as the appropriate investment that will have a job creation effect, but it’s not the primary driver,” Reed said. “It sets the stage in which the private sector can expand.”
Gibson supports rural broadband and persuaded the House to reverse a plan by his Republican colleagues to eliminate funding for the program in fiscal 2012. He said he views rural broadband as a type of infrastructure spending.
Hanna agrees with his Republican colleagues on the need to remove federal regulations. But what’s even more important, he said, is providing the science, engineering, technology and math education needed to bolster American competitiveness.
“The core of the problem is that we’ve lost our middle class,” Hanna said. “People don’t mind so much where they are in life as long as they have a belief that the system is fair and open and that through hard work and energy and entrepreneurship they can transform their lives.”
BTUMULTY

Sidebar

Gillibrand has jobs plan, but no numbers goal

When Hillary Rodham Clinton ran for the Senate in 2000, she promised to bring 200,000 jobs to upstate New York.

But between January 2001, when Clinton was sworn in as a senator, and January 2010, when she resigned to become secretary of state, the northern suburbs and upstate region lost more than 100,000 jobs.

Clinton’s tenure as a senator included the Great Recession of 2007-09, when millions of Americans lost jobs.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, Clinton’s successor, has come up with her own strategy for boosting employment in upstate New York — a five-part plan to provide federal loans, grants and bonding assistance for local governments, and a new tax credit for agriculture.

But unlike Clinton, Gillibrand isn’t predicting how many jobs her plan might create.

“It’s very hard to determine, first of all,” Gillibrand said. “And second of all, you are going to try to pitch for each piece. And there’s never an expectation you are going to get it all done. Your goal is to get the funds. And at the end of the day the government doesn’t create jobs. These small businesses and these manufacturers do. So it’s not like we can take credit for it, anyway.”