An Old Idea for a New Age

 All over America, our citizens are having a difficult time finding work. But young people are particularly hard hit. In the past when we have had serious economic downturns, the government provided emergency employment so that people could get by until the economy recovered. We should have been doing that since this crisis started. But since unemployment is so high, we can still do things to help people deal with this crisis. Let’s employee young people to make a America better place. We’ve done it before. We can do it again.

James Pilant

A Civilian Conservation Corps for the Modern Age | John Bridgeland

More than 80 years ago, FDR saw power in marrying two threatened resources — millions of unemployed young men during the Great Depression with the public lands beset by deforestation and soil erosion. His CCC put more than three million young men into productive service over a decade with impressive results: Three billion trees planted, 97,999 miles of fire roads built, 800 parks constructed and proper drainage for more than 84 million acres of agricultural land (almost the equivalent acreage of our entire National Park System). But FDR knew that the transformation ran deeper — not only in helping support young men and their families, but \”the moral and spiritual value of such work.\”

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Given the needs today, with high youth unemployment, 6.7 million young people disconnected from school and work, two million veterans returning from war, and public lands and waterways in desperate need of our attention, our country has the opportunity to marry vulnerable resources once again. The 21st Century Conservation Service Corps points the way.

via A Civilian Conservation Corps for the Modern Age | John Bridgeland.