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The JG program has been discussed at length in the literature (e.g., Kaboub 2007). It solves the problem of unemployment over the long run by instituting a federally funded but locally administered program that ensures a voluntary job opportunity to anyone who is ready, willing, and able to work in a public service project at a base wage. There are multiple implementation designs such a program can take. This policy note proposes that, in the United States, the program would be most effectively run through the social enterprise sector.
The Social Enterprise Sector Creates the Jobs, Not the Federal Government
The JG is an employment safety net. It is not designed to replace existing welfare supports, including traditional unemployment insurance (in that sense, participation in the JG is voluntary); nor is it incompatible with or a replacement for private sector employment. Quite the contrary, one of its core features (the buffer stock) makes it symbiotic and interdependent with private sector activity (more below). The federal government funds the program, but nonprofit social entrepreneurial ventures (SEVs) and traditional nonprofit organizations propose, manage, and run the projects. We can use the already existing infrastructure to launch it: convert the nation’s unemployment offices to “employment offices” and let them register all those unemployed who wish to work in the social sector at a base wage (e.g., a living wage). Allow nonprofits and SEVs to hire workers from the register to become involved in the kind of important work these groups are already doing.
http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/pn_14_1.pdf
The Social Enterprise Sector Creates the Jobs, Not the Federal Government
The JG is an employment safety net. It is not designed to replace existing welfare supports, including traditional unemployment insurance (in that sense, participation in the JG is voluntary); nor is it incompatible with or a replacement for private sector employment. Quite the contrary, one of its core features (the buffer stock) makes it symbiotic and interdependent with private sector activity (more below). The federal government funds the program, but nonprofit social entrepreneurial ventures (SEVs) and traditional nonprofit organizations propose, manage, and run the projects. We can use the already existing infrastructure to launch it: convert the nation’s unemployment offices to “employment offices” and let them register all those unemployed who wish to work in the social sector at a base wage (e.g., a living wage). Allow nonprofits and SEVs to hire workers from the register to become involved in the kind of important work these groups are already doing.
http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/pn_14_1.pdf
