A DIFFERENT KIND OF UNCERTAINTY…. On Friday, after fairly encouraging job numbers were released, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said unemployment would be even better were it not for “uncertainty.” A day later, in the weekly Republican address, Boehner added that the status quo is “creating uncertainty for our job creators.”
Eric, a reader in Illinois, emailed to argue that the House Speaker is overlooking “another form of uncertainty.” I’m reprinting his email with permission.
I work for a government contractor which is facing a 20% cut thanks the House budget. While we don’t expect this, it’s a possibility and some sort of furlough is a likelihood for all of us. Every single person I know is holding off spending money (you know, stimulating the economy) because we don’t know what is coming and how much we’ll be paid for the rest of the year. Or if we’ll be paid.
Multiply that by the 200-700K direct job losses across the entire federal government and add in the possibility of a government shutdown and you’ve got a lot of uncertainty and a lot of money sitting on the sidelines.
If Boehner and the congressional GOP were sincere about eliminating “uncertainty,” they could address with relative ease.
But they’re not.
