JG will be conditioned on cuts to the welfare system

Political economy concerns Lastly, there are significant political economy concerns. A first such concern is the impact of a JGP on public sector unions. The distinction between government sector employment and guaranteed employment is artefactual, and both contribute to national income at cost. Consequently, there would likely be considerable pressure to lower public sector wages and benefits to the level of the guaranteed job on grounds that the work is similar. In effect, there is a high risk that a JGP could be used to open a new front for undermining public sector unions and public sector remuneration. A second political economy concern is workfare. Not only may the JGP be used to undermine the character of public sector employment, it can also be used to undermine the right to welfare. Thus, the right to welfare can be made conditional on accepting a guaranteed employment job. In this fashion, a JGP can become a double-edged sword, cutting upward against the public sector and downward against the welfare system. That is not an outlandish speculation in the context of US political economy, where the large prison population is already being exploited to work for near-free for the benefit of politically connected labor-intensive private industry.