WHATEVER HAPPENED TO JOBS, JOBS, JOBS?

The current Democratic administration has been severely criticized for spending so much time on the Obamacare legislation instead of creating jobs. Of course, President Obama campaigned on getting a health care bill passed and he did. So now that the Republicans have taken over the House of Representatives, what are they doing to create jobs?

Well first they read the constitution out loud (HR 5). Well, they read most of it, eliminating the parts about slavery, for example. Their first bill (passed unanimously) was to get the Government Printing Office to stop printing so many copies of bills and resolutions that can be read online, saving maybe $6 million (only $1.3 trillion to go). What’s more, this legislation will probably eliminate some jobs, not increase them. Oh well, it will save some trees.

Then of course, we had the vote to repeal Obamacare (HR 2). Everyone knew this piece of legislation was going nowhere so, even though Obamacare was billed as a jobs killing bill by the Republicans, this vote of principal created no jobs.

I believe the next piece of legislation in the House will be to make sure that there is no government funding of abortions (HR 3). President Obama has already given an executive order to stop any Federal money that might go to abortions, but I guess the House wants redundancy. Lack of government money to fund abortions will probably decrease jobs somewhat (surgeons, nurses, etc.), but it is the principal of the thing.

Also high on the list is the Small Business Paperwork Mandate Elimination Act (HR 4) which has 254 cosponsors and is currently in committee. My first thought is that eliminating paperwork will cause some job loss because the people won’t be needed to fill out the paperwork, but then it may be neutral because the people that would do the paperwork may be replaced by others doing more productive work. My guess is that the bill will be passed, possibly unanimously.

Also to be addressed is HR 5 which is the New House Rules and, of course, doesn’t deal with jobs.

So when will the house start to deal with jobs?