States led job guarantee solves and is key to promoting democracy.

States, Municipalities, and Community Groups States and municipalities assist in the administration of the program. They help in the disbursement of funds and are responsible for the design and implementation at the local level. As discussed above, they conduct community assessment surveys and design the Community Jobs Bank. The involvement of citizens, local community groups, and other stakeholders that represent public interests can ensure that the program enhances participatory democracy in the decision-making process of designing, managing, and funding the projects. One-Stop Job Centers The JG need not reinvent the wheel in terms of administrative infrastructure. Local unemployment offices have already been rebranded as local job centers, also called One-Stop Career Centers or American Job Centers. They are already charged with providing many services to the unemployed, from the actual payments (UI checks) to job-search assistance, referrals, training, GED completion, resume building, English as a second language, instruction in math and reading, and other one-on-one services, such as stress management and financial planning. These unemployment offices can become genuine employment offices by also offering employment opportunities on demand through the JG. Due to chronic job shortages, current attempts to match unemployed workers with employers are largely ineffective. While some outfits may do better than others, in the absence of readily available and abundant job opportunities, going through an unemployment office can often be a stressful and even punitive experience. While they offer some training and education services, at the macro level, training tends to serve the function of shifting people along the unemployment line. These outfits can become fully functional One-Stop Job Centers and provide the needed JG employment opportunities, while continuing to assist the enrollees with training, education, and transitioning to private sector employment opportunities. Under the JG program they essentially become the hubs for the local jobs bank that link interested individuals with JG positions. Public Institutions, NGOs, and Social Enterprises These are the project-executing organizations. As discussed above, during the design phase of the program, a series of organizations can be identified that will supply opportunities on demand. Others can be added over time. The job opportunities with these organizations are “inventoried” with the Community Jobs Banks/job centers. Once the unemployed have been registered at the One-Stop Job Centers, they are provided a menu of work options with the project-executing organizations. Identification of project-executing organizations is contingent on the general guidelines provided by the DOL, which are in turn informed by the mission statement of the JG. The types of work/jobs that will be performed, as well as the organizations that will employ the unemployed, will be contingent on what is defined as the “public purpose.” Participatory Democracy One of the aspirations of the JG program is to foster a process whereby jobs and projects are proposed and managed from the bottom up—i.e., via direct input of community members and other stakeholders. Because it is a locally based program that targets the needs of the community and its members, the program lends itself to broad participation of constituents in its design and operation. Indeed, for its long-term success, participatory governance is likely a prerequisite. There are many models and real-world experiences that can inform a design that incorporates citizen engagement, public decision-making, and local institution building. For example, participatory budgeting can ensure that municipalities rely on citizen input about the local projects that require funding and involve them in the budgeting process itself. Experience with participatory budgeting shows that it significantly improves the effectiveness and results of local social programs. It may be considered desirable for the federal government to provide only 85 percent of all the funding, requesting that nonprofits, municipalities, and other social enterprises participate with some resources. These can take the form of physical resources, e.g., some of the materials or facilities where the work will take place can come from the project-executing agencies. This arrangement could create local stakeholders and additional buy-in from states and communities. Because the program aspires for citizen input, because it drastically reduces the threat of unemployment, because it puts pressure on punitive labor practices in the private sector, because it establishes a labor standard for pay and working conditions, and because it focuses exclusively on investing in the public good, it can be an institution with profound democratizing tendencies, and a conduit for transformative change in the workplace, people’s everyday lives, and the economy as a whole.