STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Wednesday, 23 January 2013

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22. United States of Crisis Seen Costing Jobs, Wasting Money

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-23/united-states-of-crisis-seen-costing-jobs-wasting-money.html

With the stroke of his pen the day after New Year’s, President Barack Obama extended a $5 billion farm subsidy program that he opposes and many farmers say they no longer need.

The day before, the U.S. Senate and House -- where there is broad agreement that the direct farm payments program should be scrapped -- both voted to keep the money flowing as part of a last-minute agreement to avert most of more than $600 billion in automatic tax increases and spending cuts slated to take effect this month.

The story of how an agriculture program widely seen as outdated lived to see another day in a capital obsessed with budget-cutting highlights the unintended consequences of the dysfunction that has taken hold in Washington, D.C. Obama and congressional Republicans have settled into what economists, government officials and lawmakers from both political parties agree is a damaging pattern of governing by crisis, to the detriment of economic growth, the government’s standing at home and abroad, and the nation’s fiscal health.

“Predictability and the rule of law are the key elements to a successful economy and a successful country, but the new normal is a crisis economy,” said former Defense Secretary William S. Cohen, a Republican, in an interview. “It means that other countries that look to the United States to be the great stabilizing force that we’ve been start to have doubts about that. It’s a crisis in the political structure, and it means you’re on the road to economic decline.”