The ranks of jobless Floridians, currently numbering more than a million, could triple by the end of next year as a result of the devastating oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, says economist Farid A. Khavari, a Democratic candidate for governor of Florida.
Khavari believes that recession-ravaged Florida — a state currently plagued by a 12.3 percent unemployment rate — can expect to see that number increase to as many as three million over the next nineteen months as a result of the environmental and economic disaster in the Gulf.
“The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico will be a blight on the Gulf Coast for many years to come,” says Khavari, the author of nine scholarly books, including Environomics: The Economics of Environmentally Safe Prosperity, published by Praeger in 1993.
One of several challengers to Democratic frontrunner Alex Sink, Florida’s chief financial officer, in the state’s August primary, the Iranian-born author and economist believes that the number of foreclosures in Florida is likely to swell from the current level of 800,000 to as many as 2 million by the end of 2011. The little-known candidate from Miami also believes that the state’s uninsured population could grow to between 4.5 to 5 million during that same period as a direct result of the oil spill.
Khavari, who received his PhD in economics from the University of Bremen in West Germany, believes that the state’s $600 billion tourism industry will be devastated as a result of last month’s catastrophic explosion on the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil drilling platform. “Revenues from tourism will start to reduce drastically,” he said, adding that “property values will go belly up.” In turn, he contends that a significant drop in housing prices will cause a sharp decline in property taxes, thereby creating an increasingly serious fiscal crisis for hundreds of already hard-hit Florida communities.
“Florida could begin to resemble Somalia before this is over,” he says wistfully. “We’ll be seeing people leave Florida for other states.”
Khavari, 67, whose under-funded and struggling gubernatorial campaign has been largely ignored by the mainstream media, promises to “fight tooth and nail to block offshore drilling in Florida’s waters.”
“We don’t need Florida’s offshore oil. In the years it would take to bring in that oil, Florida can fix its economy and protect our environment by using clean solar energy. The new generation of plug-in hybrid cars will dramatically reduce the amount of oil we need. But it’s not just about the environment, it’s simple economics,” he said.
Khavari’s campaign web site is www.khavariforgovernor.com.
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