Cause and effect

Well, this is a surprise.

North Carolina's jobless rate just topped 10 percent for the first time in almost a year. What happened? "Private companies added 6,900 jobs, but state and local governments shed 12,100 workers. Local school districts made up a majority of the 11,800 layoffs by the state's local governments."

Those layoffs are the direct result of the budget put forth by our Republican-controlled Legislature. That would be the budget that Gov. Perdue vetoed, so don't even try and lay this at her feet. This is just the latest sad example of the short-sightedness of conservatives in our state.

Those 12,100 workers who are now unemployed (and therefore are getting taxpayer-funded unemployment benefits) paid mortgages or rent, they bought groceries and school supplies and hired plumbers. And they're able to do a lot less of that today. Which means that these budget cuts don't just affect the 12,100 who lost their jobs. They'll ripple throughout the local economy and will likely put a lot of others out of work, too.

Speaking of ripple effects... "Local school districts made up a majority of the 11,800 layoffs by the state's local governments."

So much of what's great about the state education system can be credited to decisions our governor and Legislature made 40 and 50 years ago - to establish the Governor's School enrichment program, the N.C. School of Science and Math and UNC School of the Arts, etc. These schools didn't just educate; they provided jobs and attracted professionals from across the country. Then their graduates went on to work and create jobs in a feedback loop that's pretty much solely responsible for, say, the Triad's film industry or the Research Triangle Park. Look at my city's annual film festival, or the investment bank where my sister works. Public education did that.

How many medical researchers are going to look at our Legislature's hostility to public investment and then take their lucrative operations elsewhere? How many internationally acclaimed filmmakers aren't going to come teach here? How many out-of-state tuition-paying parents aren't going to send their kids to college here? How many learning-disabled children are going to end up dropping out before they graduate high school? How many laid-off textile workers aren't going to be able to afford re-training at a local community college?

And how many jobs would these people go on to create or support? Conservatives love to talk about trickle-down economics as if it only applies to the wealthiest one percent of our population. Not true.

These are questions that our current Legislature doesn't seem to care about. I think we need to make them.