Mountain Climbing

I've got a good job

And I'm newly born

You should see me dressed up in my uniform

--The Who

Today President Obama hosted a 'jobs summit' with expressed intentions of determining ways to create more jobs. Some suggest that this effort is nothing more than political granstanding (such an accusation cannot be thoroughly refuted).

Genuine or not, this effort can only bear fruit if the outcomes find government backing away from the situation and letting the system cleanse itself. Our economic system is currently burdened by excess capacity and a dependence on consumption that has been fueled by debt. Market forces seek to retire capacity and reduce consumption and debt via more savings. A natural consequence of this condition is that jobs will be lost (many would not have been created in the first place were it not for the artificial boom that preceded this bust).

Large-scale sustainable employment will return once the system comes back into balance.

The longer we delay this cleansing process, the further out into the future it will be before meaningful job growth returns. Moreover, government actions to add more capacity, consumption, and debt to the system are likely to destroy, not create, meaningful jobs that will be most accretive to future standard of living.

Do you think any of President Obama's focus groups offered this up as a prudent solution today?