Iowa Hate: ABC News: 'Rural job creation plan may simply shift resources'

This one ain't just Iowa, folks. It hits everybody who's ever felt that, ya know, rural folks deserve doctors too, and maybe a modicum of health care, and all that. But it happened because of President Obama's rural jobs tour, which took place in Peosta, Iowa, so it's going on the blog.

The offense: Pretty much the biggest premise of the article, but specifically the following:

Bronars also said the allowing citizens to access Labor Department job search information at field offices could be beneficial, but the key question is whether applicants’ skills will match the positions for which employers are hiring.

Economists would have difficulty estimating the number of jobs created from the preliminary plans. Bronars warns that targeting job creation in rural areas could potentially displace a job in another area of the country. ...

If this rural physician is displaced from an urban or suburban area,  Bronars said there may be one fewer physician in urban and suburban areas, which could lead to less revenue and fewer jobs where the physician would have otherwise been placed.

“The net impact of this program on jobs must account for both the increase in health services provided in the rural communities and the decrease in services provided in other areas,” which will likely lead to lower job creation numbers, Bronars said.

The offender: Stephen Bronars, a senior economist with Welch Consulting in Washington, D.C. (Nothing says "I talk to the press all day" like that title.) And yet, here we have another Midwesterner In Name Only -- Bronars went to three different schools in Illinois, including the University of Illinois Urbana, which is sort of rural if Bronars happened to step beyond the bounds of campus once in a while and notice things.

And while it's clear ABC News sought him out to assess the economic plan as it relates to job creation, and not to muse on whether farm folks deserve them some physicians, Bronars clearly does both.

Breakin' down the nastiness:

"Allowing citizens to access Labor Department job search information at field offices could be beneficial, but the key question is whether applicants’ skills will match the positions for which employers are hiring" -- keep in mind, here, that what we're talking about is making current, already-in-existence USDA offices nationwide, of which there are 2,800, keep job search information available. That's it. Help people get better access to job information when they're out of work without spending another dime on a new office. And we're supposed to believe this only "could be beneficial?" And maybe it won't be because those dumb, backwards rednecks wouldn't even have no skills for jobs anyway?

Mean level: On a scale from "peeved" to "rioting with a pitchfork," I'm giving it "smoke coming out of my ears." Next.

"Targeting job creation in rural areas could potentially displace a job in another area of the country" -- Oh NOES! The jobs! They are being potentially taken, by this plan, and given to the backwoods hicks! Whatever will the urbanites, who so deserve it more, do now? Are we going to make THEM move to rural places? If those rural people want jobs, THEY should move! Obviously! Because that's definitely not what is already happening. Brain drain, psh -- that's just what some science-y people who moved to the country thought up. If we pack all them people into sardine cans in New York City, we can just put all the jobs THERE! Problem solved! We only use 10 percent of our brains anyway; why not do the same with our economy?

(sarcasm paragraph over)

Really, Bronars? Did you think this up when your wait at Starbucks went up from 8 minutes to 10, and you figured it was because they had to fire someone due to the economy giving jobs to the farm folks and all? News flash: rural jobs, which tend to be of the agricultural and manufacturing sort, are disappearing at a rapid rate. This has been happening for a long time. Know how to change that? With more job opportunities in the rural sector! I think it's actually the point of President Obama's plan. WEIRD, I KNOW. MAYBE YOU SHOULD READ IT.

Mean level: On a scale of "iced mocha" to "double expresso," I'm going with "steamer."

"If this rural physician is displaced from an urban or suburban area, Bronars said there may be one fewer physician in urban and suburban areas" --- OK, OK, wait. There are long lines and such, in big cities! And they need more doctors because they have more population! But are we REALLY saying that, in order to give them farm folks a doctor that they don't have to drive two hours to see, we have to take away a doctor in a big city, thereby increasing their wait times and potentially harming the health of hundreds just to get Farmer Ned in for his annual physical?

Leaving aside the question of who deserves care more -- Rural Ron or Urban...Ursula? (suggestions on U-names accepted at amzpoet@gmail.com) -- this assertion simply isn't true. There ARE doctors in urban areas. There simply aren't doctors in rural areas. Period. End of story. Ned and Ron have to get into their pickups and drive down country roads for hours at a time until they get to a hospital that can treat all their needs. If they're lucky, they can drive less than an hour for one of those clinics that might not even have an M.D. on staff. True story. If you have a heart attack, 20 percent of the population of the United States is probably trusting it all to a nurse practitioner or, heavens, simply a midwife. That's what they mean by "rural health clinic."

People all over the country, and the world, are increasingly moving to the cities for work because there isn't work in the rural areas that they want to accept. But there are also loads of people who want to stay in their hometown and, therefore, get trained for a skill their hometown would employ them at. What if that skill is medicine, and their town just opened up a clinic? Are you saying that, because this young person would have otherwise moved to the Big City, that they don't deserve to stay in their hometown and treat their own? Or that a Big Cityan who wants to move to the country shouldn't?

Or maybe, just maybe, Bronars is saying that now that the rough economy has come to the big bad urban areas, those rural problems aren't as important. They're not going to impact "job creation," after all. Rural people need doctors; so what? It's not his problem to be nice to farm folks. It's his job to talk about the economy.

Just at the expense of Iowans.