Why The Private Sector is Doing Fine:

Romney, Boehner et al can’t have it both ways!

by
Dominique DiPrima

Most pundits on the left and the right agree that President Barack Obama made a serious gaffe when – in passing – he stated that “the private sector is doing fine.” Right wing politicians and strategists have had a field day doing their best to paint the President as out of touch or unable to grasp the workings of a capitalist economy. We are in the heat of what will be a very tough campaign season and I’m sure the President wishes he wouldn’t have said it, as evidenced by his clarification shortly thereafter that the economy is not “doing fine.” I too wish he wouldn’t have said it, but only because it may hurt his re-election bid. Not because it isn’t true! Because, the fact is, when you look at what the president was actually saying, not just the soundbite, the President was right.

The Commander-in-Chief was making the point he made because our public sector jobs are under attack, shrinking and under the budget axe nationwide. And because states and cities across the country are facing major fiscal crisis that threaten their very survival. He was talking about his priorities in terms of keeping the Titanic afloat. If you’ve been paying attention, you may have noticed that the President has already done quite a bit to stabilize the private sector – a $787 billion dollar stimulus plan, bank bailouts, auto industry bailout, payroll tax holidays, a healthcare bill to name a few.

The investment in maintaining the public sector has been relatively modest. We know that some teachers, cops and firefighters kept their jobs thanks to the stimulus package. And states have benefitted from infrastructure projects and educational dollars from the feds. But no undertaking of the size and scope of the stimulus package has been aimed at public employees, state and local government.

Mitt Romney (as he stated in response to the President’s unfortunate choice of words) and Congressman Paul Ryan may consider local firefighters, cops and teachers to be “big government.” But most of us look at them as people, people who have jobs, jobs that provide essential services to our communities. Even Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker broke with Romney to say he didn’t consider teachers and firefighters to be big government. But when you look at the policies Walker is imposing in his state, or that Ryan proposes in his draconian budget, those exact professions could be pushed out of the middle class, or onto the unemployment roles in droves.

These so-called business savvy politicians want to have it both ways. Out of one side of their mouths that claim to be job-creators, while slashing public sector jobs and pensions and outsourcing entire industries out of the other.

Public sector jobs are jobs. For many people of color they are the very jobs that lifted our families out of poverty into the ranks of the middle class with the help of their powerful unions. And yet as the right wing millionaire politicians would tell it this is big government and needs to be cut. From the post office to the local librarian, what we are really talking about are workers – workers who do important jobs!

Mitt Romney is the perfect example of how the private sector is doing fine. He made 25 million dollars over the past two years, paying an average of 12% tax and benefitting handsomely from the Bush tax Cuts for the wealthy, corporate loopholes, and overseas tax havens. And yet he has the nerve to put out a video mocking the Presidents gaffe and saying the President is out of touch. Romney’s video seems to feature many of the same workers his policies would force into joblessness after he finished labeling them “big government.” All the while he is busy trying to get the ultimate government job for himself!

The head of a typical publicly traded company made $9.6 million dollars in 2011. That is up 6% from the previous year and is at the highest level since the Associated Press started tracking it in 2006. Profits at the Standard & Poors 500 stock index rose 16% last year. Meanwhile schools are laying off teachers, and canceling summer school. Cities are cutting library hours and critical emergency services. In this context, indeed the private sector is doing fine. Fine is relative. And for those of us in critical condition, stable, right about now is looking “just fine.”