While I was trying to get a suitable passing grade in my Calculus and Science courses that last quarter, I wasn’t completely cut-off from the blogosphere or the world of “professional” political writing. I could read a small amount, but I just didn’t have time to post on most of it.
Which is why I have two months of links sitting on a flash drive waiting to be expanded upon. You all will be seeing them over the next couple weeks falling from my keyboard onto the front page along with more current items.
One of the more interesting pieces I read was on the topic of balancing the federal budget by shutting down a list of particular agencies. The piece itself was of average quality and intellect, but it introduced me to a little known State Department agency I had never before knew existed:
Have you ever heard of “OPIC”?
The Overseas Private Investment Corporation offers US government based insurance for private ventures both inside and outside the US.
Are you in Germany and want to open a chain of strudel bakeries? OPIC is your pal. They like that you won’t be importing your workforce and they probably dig them some tasty apple strudel like all good Americans.
Are you a group of American investors who want to open a factory in Afghanistan but are afraid of losing all your money on a bad geopolitical turn? OPIC is there to insure you when no one else would.
And there is a perfectly good reason no one else will insure you: It is a bad risk. In fact, it is a horrible risk. One that should not be taken up by those who are not prepared to lose every red cent they put into it.
Over the last two decades, OPIC has been insuring thousands, if not tens of thousands, of ventures outside the US that pulled jobs previously held by American citizens to factories and offices in foreign countries.
Yes, you read that correctly: Your tax dollars are being spent to insure outsourcing.
The Simpson-Bowles Commission recommended disbanding the OPIC in their highly criticized report. I would only amputate the portion of the office that subsidizes ventures outside the US. I think that, for now, we could keep the portion that insures foreign investment in the US. At least until we get back to a reasonable unemployment rate of, say, 6%.
After that I think we could eliminate the office entirely and take it from there.
My tax dollars are being spent to encourage outsourcing by the EPA, the Departments of Labor, Interior, and Energy, the SEC, and the IRS.
I doubt OPIC is doing nearly the damage any of the above.
The slippery slope continues to get slipprier!
Merle