Cash for caulkers

How about some cash in return for weatherizing your home? Or a job? How about both?

It’s the latest idea circulating in Washington—government cash incentives to encourage you to plug up those drafty houses, insulate them, and switch to efficient light bulbs.

If the title “cash for caulkers” rings like “cash for clunkers,” that’s the point. The clunkers program was wildly successful, with almost 700,000 (lots of Ford Explorers), turned in. Car sales shot up. (We’ll note that the DIVA-mobile, a 1994 Volvo, did not qualify as a clunker.) 

Two birds with one stone
 “Cash for caulkers” is the brainchild of one of Silicon Valley’s most prominent venture capitalists, John Doerr. As described by the New York Times, the program could reduce energy usage and costs, and also create jobs—for the caulkers! This particular program would cost $23 billion over two years, though no word on exactly how it would be paid for (assume taxes).

And while the environmental element is a nice bonus—climate talks are building heading ahead of the crucial Copenhagen summit next month—job creation is on everybody’s mind in Washington these days. 

Looking for a lifeline...

While we’re losing fewer jobs each month, the picture is still rather bleak: a 10.2 percent unemployment rate equals about 30 million people out of work.

With a health bill passed in the House and one headed for a vote in the Senate, law makers are already buzzing about a possible jobs bill. President Obama is convening a jobs conference at the White House next month.

You’ll hear debate over whether this is a bill to stimulate the overall economy or just a jobs bill, whether the country can afford it, if it’s necessary and so on. Among the proposals so far are: 1) tax incentives for companies that hire, and 2) new jobs created through programs paid for with unused and returned TARP funds (better roads and bridges). 

The big picture
These are all just ideas right now and you can be sure that nothing will happen before the health-care ship has set sail. But that doesn’t mean you won’t hear plenty of talk in the meantime about the need for jobs. There’s still plenty of frustration out there that so much money went to Wall Street and not Main Street, uncertainty over exactly how many jobs were created by the first stimulus bill, and perhaps most importantly, elections next year: Every member of the House and over a third of the Senate is up for re-election in November of 2010.