A member of Congress with a famous family name is proposing a simple solution to the bringing down the unemployment rate: Put approximately 15 million people on the federal payroll with a $40,000 a year salary. The proposal would revive concepts that saw a Civilian Conservation Corps plant trees, build dams, and forge roads and a Works Progress Administration that built airports and paid authors and photographers to ply their trade on behalf of the US Government. As fanatical as I am about the proper role of government, even I have to admit that the CCC and WPA probably represent the best instincts of government. Maybe I have a soft spot for the concept because I grew up swimming and camping at a place built by the CCC in the late 30s. Say what you will about it having been a “make work” project, but their efforts have held up pretty well under 80 years of continual use.

Maybe more importantly, the CCC and WPA made constructive work part of the requirement to receive federal assistance. In the 30s, your options were pretty much work or starve. I wonder, though, if those concepts would still hold up. How many people receiving federal assistance would be willing to go to work camps in the wilderness, to sweep their cities streets, or to lift a hand to earn what we now think of as entitlements? As a result of their experiences during the Depression, my grandfather saved soap slivers that he eventually pressed together into a new bar and my grandmother used the same teabag for cup after cup of tea despite the need for them to do these things being long past. When’s the last time any of us even thought about doing something like that?

I never in my life thought I could be convinced to line up with Representative Jesse Jackson Jr on an issue, but I think this one at least has academic merit. I don’t necessarily agree with all his reasoning or the total numbers he’s talking about, but I have to admit I really like the concept. Let’s face it, we’re going to pay unemployment, welfare, and a raft of other “entitlements” anyway, so why not make productivity a requirement for receiving unemployment and other funds from the government?

This is probably the point where someone is going to come to my door to collect my Republican Party membership card.