Construction Process Idea

Emma

Emma

Starter
#1
#1
I just thought something up, and I want to know if it sounds ridiculous.

Damning contingency: This requires tax payer's funds.

If the city were interested in lowering the unemployment rate (at least among construction workers), get multiple developers involved, and launch an urban redevelopment project all at once, this is what I figure they should do:

The county / city should set aside funds, perhaps roughly 150 - 200 million a year, taken from social aid programs (only ones that are directed towards aiding the unemployed who are willing to work), and other unemployment / development related expense funds, to aid in the construction of a massive entertainment district. Unemployed persons who are even remotely qualified that are interested, and various developers, could apply to work on the site in lieu of receiving things like unemployment (of course this is not the only wrinkle / benefit, but such a grand scale thing is hard to concentrate into a small post). They would be paid like state workers, and be provided adequate health coverage for their families. Also, donated materials for building would become tax write offs. Such a plan would be interesting, huh?

Edit:
I have no idea what our program funds look like now, and I'm really just stabbing in the dark, so forgive me a little if this does sound ridiculous.
 
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Trueblood

Trueblood

Bench
#2
#2
Interesting idea. I would have to think that inexperienced workers would be limited to pouring cement, driving smaller trucks to and from the construction site and things of that nature but it's better than nothing.
 
kennadog

kennadog

Dog On It!
#5
#5
It sounds great, but it likely would take changes in the law. An awful lot of funding sources (state, federal and local) require payment of "prevailing wage" (State) or "Davis-Bacon" wages (federal).

Also, if it is lower paying jobs, you might be helping some people get off unemployment only to put some higher wage workers out of a job and onto unemployment (or keep them there). Either that or they agree to be paid less and can't pay their bills. And I don't mean union wages, necessarily. Minimum wage is well below the poverty line for most families.
 
VF21

VF21

Super Moderator Emeritus
SME
#6
#6
Does the term "labor union" mean anything?

;)

The unions are incredibly strong in Sacramento; even cement pourers have unions. They are not going to stand by and allow non-union people to come in and work for less.
 
kennadog

kennadog

Dog On It!
#7
#7
And you don't nwecessarily want unskilled people doing construction work. Cement pouring is a skilled job, if done properly. Believe me, I've seen some pretty horrific DIY concrete work. :p Even among supposedly trained people, quality of work can differ.

Most likely job for non-skilled is "general laborer." Lifting, moving, loading, unloading, cleaning up, etc. There's already plenty of people that will jump at those jobs, whether they are currently on unemployment or not. I work with low-income people and plenty of them work two and three jobs to make ends meet.

However, there will be more jobs as the economy turns, including goverment-assisted projects, such as the railyards redevelopment, a new Cal Expo, which was planned, before the arena idea came up.
 
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