To really roll back poverty in Bridgeport and cities like it --- and in the process make those cities safer --- you have to put masses of unemployed people to work, and give them sustainable incomes and real hope.
Bridgeport and other cities cannot solve this problem on their own.
What's needed are large publicly-funded jobs programs coming from the state and federal governments along the lines of the New Deal.
The private sector --- at least on a substantial level --- is not going to create jobs. The industries that used to employ thousands in Bridgeport are gone. They're not coming back.
In the new globalized economy manufacturing firms will not come here when they can pay workers so much less in China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Mexico.
Service and retail jobs have been created to a certain extent, and there will be more in the future. But in terms of overall numbers, these jobs won't fill the void. You're still going to have thousands of people looking for work in Bridgeport.
The same picture applies to old industrial cities throughout the Northeast and Midwest.
In the depths of the Depression in the 1930s, President Franklin Roosevelt began the New Deal, with a central aim of putting people back to work. He said, paraphrasing, 'if the private sector won't provide jobs, the government will.'
The New Deal, in particular the Works Progress Administration, put over 8 million people to work between 1935 and 1943. That was a lot of people then, and it would still be a lot of people today.
WPA workers went out and built roads, bridges, schools, hospitals and airports.
There's no reason why this kind of public works jobs program can't be set up again. We have the money. This nation's incredibly bloated military budget can be cut, freeing up billions. Rich people and corporations can be taxed more heavily, creating billions more.
A New Deal for 2015 in this country is entirely dooable and absolutely necessary. Isn't there a need to put people to work today rebuilding our nation's roads, bridges and schools?
A major public jobs program on the state level is also possible. Again, the money is there. The claims of Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy that times are tight and the state has to cut back are as wrongheaded as can be. Connecticut is the richest state in the country, and has incredibly well-off residents, including billionaires. Just summon the political will and levy a higher tax on the wealthy, and plenty of new funds will be raised.
The old idea that the private sector will provide all the jobs necessary, as long as business and the wealthy are not taxed too much and corporations are not regulated too much, has been discredited. It doesn't work.
The government has to be involved in job creation. This is the only way for really turning our national economy around and rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. It will also put people to work in cities across the country, like Bridgeport, and ultimately create better and safer urban environments.
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