Posts Tagged ‘unemployment’
Unemployment Emergency
Tuesday, July 6th, 2010Good governance is rooted in common sense. Here is a common sense truth: Everyone’s agenda depends on a prosperous economy. The Great Generation knew the human cost when bad times last for a long time. They grew up in the Depression. They knew that without prosperity we can not nurture and educate our children, protect our communities, or care for the poor. Whether you are a liberal or conservative, your agenda depends on America’s ability to produce jobs, create wealth, and expand opportunity. And that depends on a vibrant free market economy.
Where are the jobs?
Tuesday, June 8th, 2010It was not surprising that the markets tanked after Friday’s jobs report. Of the 431,000 jobs created, just 41,000 of them were private sector jobs – the rest: temporary Census workers. As Chair of the House Committee on Small Business, Sen. Talent learned how the small business owner thinks. They are risk takers, but they are not foolish. The current uncertainty caused by changing regulations and health care burdens has caused them to pull back in a big way.The private sector can’t be the economic engine that we need it to be, until the government realizes the best thing it can do for the economy is provide a reasonable (and certain) regulatory frame work and cut burdensome taxes.
These disjointed government policies are a living example of Obama’s lack of executive and management experience.
Anniversary of the Stimulus
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010
This week marks the anniversary of the $800 Billion stimulus bill. It was supposed to reduce unemployment to 8%. It didn’t work. This new stimulus won’t work either.Economies grow when people use capital or labor in ways that produce more goods and services at lesser costs. Example: If Emerson Electric changes its production process to a motor at $100 instead of $110 dollars, they have just added value to the economy as a whole, because now the economy has the same motors but more money to spend on other things. The technical term for this process is: “free enterprise”. Permanent tax cuts help free enterprise because they increase the returns people get and lead to more work and investment.By proposing various temporary, narrow tax cuts, the Administration is conceding all this in principle. So here’s my question. If tax cuts don’t drive economic growth, why is the Administration proposing these little bits of tax relief? And if they do drive economic growth, why is Washington planning to raise taxes later this year?
Stimulus Bill:Take III?
Tuesday, January 12th, 2010The federal government is considering another “stimulus” plan, by which they mean that they will try to get the economy moving through more government spending. I want to ask a good faith question. What would have to happen for the advocates of such a policy to conclude that it doesn’t work?
The government has passed two stimulus plans already. Yet the recession lasted twice as long as the average postwar recession, and – what is worse – the recovery looks and feels an awful lot like the recession. (If this is what prosperity is like, what will the unemployment rate be if we have another downturn?). Let’s suppose that they pass more government spending, and unemployment stays the same. Will they then concede that government spending doesn’t generate economic growth? What if unemployment actually goes up?
One other point. Will this new “stimulus” plan have any money for defense modernization? The last one didn’t. Consider this. If there is an historical example of government spending stimulating the economy, it’s when the government, after TEN YEARS of the Depression, geared up for World War II beginning in 1940. Yet the last “stimulus” package of $800 billion didn’t spend a dime on defense modernization or the defense industrial base.
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