Apparently it's no longer the Age of Acquarius, dear flower children, but the Age of Austerity. The Morlocks are ravaging the Eloi, while unemployment continues to climb, going back up to 9.1%. And all our elected officials discuss is deficit cutting. Are they all austerity freaks?
Before the last election, the Republican mantra was, "Where are the jobs?" Now that Republicans have gained control of the House, have you seen one jobs bill?
Republicans want to cut over a couple of trillion dollars, or more, from the Federal budget during the worse recession ever since the Great Depression. Is this the jobs bill that we all have been awaiting with baited breath? The laying off of millions of additional Americans at the Federal, state, and local governmental levels? Are they trashing the economy?
Democrats are no better either, wielding axes and sledge hammers at any possible economic recovery. President Obama appointed a Deficit Commission with Medicare "on the table". And Vice President Biden stated recently that the administration and the Deficit Commission has already agreed to $1 trillion in cuts from the Federal budget; however, he also stated that no revenue increases had been agreed to, adding that would be the topic of discussion after budget cuts had been finalized. Isn't that putting the cart before the horse? Shouldn't taxes on the wealthy and corporations be included in these budget balancing acrobatics?
Corporate and individual effective tax rates are at an all-time 60-year low. Recall that when we increased taxes under President Clinton we gained 22 million jobs while when we decreased taxes under President Bush, we lost 8 million jobs. If the American corporations wish to continue sitting on $1.6 trillion instead of investing it here in the United States economy and creating the jobs that our country so desperately needs, then perhaps it's time to raise taxes on these corporations and/or their major shareholders and create the governmental revenues to finance a bold jobs bill. With Americans getting jobs, and seeing the economy reeving up, consumer spending would increase, driving up demand for manufacturing and services, and culminating in that economy recovery we have been patiently awaiting for three years!
This is essentially the budget plan proposed by the Progressive Caucus: by cutting the incredibly bloated and pork filled massive defense budget, and taxing primarily the rich and closing the loopholes and subsidies to corporations, we would provide the additional revenues required to finance bold fiscal policies to create jobs, since Corporate America does not wish to do so. And with the future increases in tax revenues from the newly employed American workers, we can then apply them to deficit reduction.
Hey, if Corporate America does not wish to invest in America, then perhaps it's time we take their monies and do it for them. Consider it an act of patriotism.
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Socialism? We have a Corporate totalitarian state
We give money to the big banks, who then lend it back to us at 3.5%. The U.S. government is now a subsidiary of Corporate America. Virtually all politicians are on the corporate payroll, including Obama. The Citizens United decision was the final nail in the coffin.
The effective corporate tax rate is at its lowest level in 60 years. And it will be even lowered further under Obama.
Social security will be cut; and Medicare will eventually be privatized.
Socialism? No, totalitarianism, a plutocrasy. Effective capitalism requires the invisible hand of Adam Smith. With Multinational Corporations owning all politicians, there is no competition but control.
Are you naive enough to believe that America is still a democracy?
This socialist mentality is the reason there is no recovery
This sentence sums it up:
"If the American corporations wish to continue sitting on $1.6 trillion instead of investing it here in the United States economy and creating the jobs that our country so desperately needs, then perhaps it's time to raise taxes on these corporations and/or their major shareholders and create the governmental revenues to finance a bold jobs bill"
Any corporation seeing this mindset will keep its share of the $1.6 trillion safely offshore in subsidiaries and invest it in other nations. The misguided mindset that thinks we can tax, borrow and spend our way to recovery has been tried as never before in human history, and failed miserably. Keynes is truly dead.
We live in a global economy where the USA has the highest taxes of any major industrialized nation. Even worse, those taxes are massively wasted and inefficiently spent. The trillion dollars spend on the first Obama stimulus failed to keep the unemployment rate below 8% as the Obama regime promised. Moreover, most of the money was spent lining the pockets of Democrat special interest groups, not creating jobs. The President laughed at the nation just the other day, saying those "shovel ready" jobs weren't shovel ready after all. Feeling like a chump yet?
To spend another trillion on a "bold jobs program" begs the question, "To do what?" Dig and then refill holes with shovels? Smash windows and then fix them? Line the pockets of more Democrat special interest groups? That will do exactly zero to end the recession. Only the private sector can determine what is needed by people to create real, self-sustaining jobs. Public spending on "make work" will only put the nation deeper in debt. And if you think job creation is bad now, wait until the nation cannot any longer finance itself by borrowing from China. The economy will collapse and unemployment will skyrocket.
The day of reckoning draws closer as S&P and Moody's are both threatening to downgrade the USA's credit rating. Unless we stop the drunken spending binge now, we face a future worse than that of Greece.
Nice try, but maybe you should get your facts from other than the 527s sponsored by the Koch Brothers et al
Mr. Clinton, in 1993, signed the largest tax increase in American history, and on top of George HW Bush's a couple of years earlier in the midst of a recession. After HW's tax increase, the GDP began to rebound as Bill Clinton took office, promising to focus like a laser on "the economy, stupid". After Clinton's 1993 tax increase on the wealthy, job growth began, and by the end of Clinton's term 23M new jobs had been created.
17M (Reagan) + 23M (Clinton) = ~40M new jobs after significant tax increases in recessions and as the economy had begun to rebound. Compare it to the nearly 8M lost under the disastrous George W Bush's economics policies focused on tax cuts for the wealthy, and one might start, just start, questioning whether the "you-can't-raise-taxes-in-a-recession" mantra might be just a bit overstated.
Too bad the facts are wrong
No actually when taxes were raised under Clinton jobs were lost, and when taxes were lowered under Bush jobs were increased. The tax rate now is actually one of the highest in the industrialized nations of the world. Other countries are lowering business and corporate tax rates so that jobs can be created in the private sector. (It appears to be working where it is tried.) If more and more money is drained from the corporate accounts (already at low levels) the corporations will not only not hire as they won't have the cash to do so, but they will have a tendency to move their operations to lower tax sites (like Ireleand) and then there will be even less jobs here.
You should try to get your "facts" from sites other than the DNC and moveon.org. For example, if you have any corporate clients, you might notice that they are struggling with cash flow and one of the major drains is taxes.
In addition, you seem to think that those that are working hard and earning the net income have no right to keep it. The real reasons for having fewer jobs is because of the uncertainty in the economy and the run away spending of the federal and some state governments. In that environment, the production of the private sector is in jeapordy due to the perception that the funds will not be available for future growth, debt reduction, and operating expenses. And government jobs do not produce value to the economy. They produce no consumable goods, no re-saleable services, no revenue or profit production. Even the consumption of goods is not a good spark for the economy, as waiting for governments to pay bills for goods purchased causes hardship for many of the small suppliers when the paperwork and administrative burdens are taken into account.