Whatever happened to the great cry for jobs?
Didn’t this President campaign on halting the financial collapse and passing a massive $800 Billion spending bill to make sure that unemployment wouldn’t exceed 8%. Now, here we are at 9.5% unemployment with private employment dropping like a rock. Federal hiring is tapering down with the end of many temporary census jobs and the massive stimulus bill starting to peter out. The only industry hiring is the Oil and Gas business.
Yet, the pending Waxman, Stupack, Marky bill (HR 5626) and the Sen Casey bill (S.1215) will do little promote jobs in the oil and gas industry. Instead HR 5626 will put such onerous requirements on off-shore drilling that few companies will endeavor to do such. The Senate bill will have the effect of restricting hydro fracing of oil and gas wells across the country.
Both bills will curtail future jobs and reduce current jobs.
Job, Jobs, Jobs, that’s what we need.
The White House has tried to help the situation by throwing more gasoline on the fire. (Forgive the pun) The EPA has ruled that the 79 of 80 mountain top coal mining permits that had been approved already are no longer valid. The other 160 permits that were pending have also be denied.
One study sited approximately 20,700 jobs will be affected by the ruling and the elimination of 60% of coal mined in West Virgina.
Now we add the effect that the April 24, 2010 New York State Environmental Conservation Commission ruling on natural gas drilling will have on employment and we can see that natural resources jobs are going the way of the goony bird. Employment has already suffered from the financial crisis, the housing crisis, the debt crisis, the manufacturing crisis and the auto industry crisis. Now the government is doing its best to strangle the natural resources industry.
How can we ever expect to have job creation with a government in charge that deems “sharing the wealth” to be more important than helping private industry to compete?
