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big business isnt the job creation engine in this country, its the SMALL business owners that are, and this administration has continually crapped on them since he was elected.
The dollar is actually fairly strong visa vi the other major currencies and even if it wasn't that would only effect imports not domestic production. In fact, it would more than likely increase exports thus leading to job creation.
In any event, as just about every economist with half a brain, we have a demand problem. There is over supply in just about every industry while demand remains slumped. Industry won't hire because they already can't find buyers for what they're currently producing plus they've learned how to brow beat concessions out of workers to get them to produce more for less money. The old right wing supply side economics won't help anyone do anything because we have excess supply and instead if you want to increase employment & output you MUST increase demand so that companies actually have orders to fill and thus a need to hire new workers.
This means a real stimulus, not one which is 70% tax cuts (which is supply side stuff which won't help in this situation) like the one in 2009, and instead and actual New Deal style stimulus where we actually go out and build things like roads, bridges, new schools, canals, new airports, etc... THAT is how you create new demand, how you get factories hiring new people to meet new demand, and how you get money actually trickling into the pockets of people who will spend it rather than just stuff it in a secret over seas account like Romney and Co always do.
True, many nations have been in a race to devalue their currencies in order to keep running up massive debt and get an advantage in foreign trade. But no, the dollar is not "fairly strong" in any way, shape or form: "Against the world’s major currencies, the dollar’s rate of exchange is down 5% since the Great Recession started, 32% from the 2001 peak, and 15% from the stability achieved in the late 1980s and early 1990s." The Weak Dollar Is Getting Caught In a Currency War Pincer - Forbes And the most frightening thing of all is this: throughout history, when nations start down the road of devaluing their own dollars, they don't stop until the currency crashes.
Since we import a huge portion of the goods we buy--like oil--dollar devaluation hurts every one of us, every day. The cost of living is double what it was 25 years ago, and wages are certainly not. Retirees try to save for retirement and find that the dollar they put away today will only be worth 50 cents in ten years when they need it. Workers live year after year with no raises, and find they are actually making LESS every year in buying power.
And yes we have a demand problem (thanks to loss of value in our earnings and savings), but tax cuts are NOT "supply side stuff which won't help in this situation." Those taxes are coming from the discretionary income of working class Americans. When you cut the amount you are confiscating, those dollars get spent on things that boost the economy--restaurants, clothes, vacations, etc. Those dollars now circulating in the local economy allow businesses to hire more workers to do lawn care, home improvements, and service jobs. And it is ALL COMPLETELY voluntary--everyone wins.
Compare that to continuing to confiscate a big chunk of the discretionary income of working Americans, which means they work hard and have NOTHING to show for it (and their local economy benefits not at all). What does Washington spend their money on? The biggest chunk is foreign wars and fattening the Military Industrial complex--losing 100% of many of those dollars because they are spent in foreign lands, never recirculating to get any supposed "multiplier effect"?
Let's assume Washington does decide to build new roads--now we have habitat destruction, environmental impacts, people displaced by eminent domain, a bill of about $1.4 billion for each 3 mile stretch (How much does it cost to build a road one mile?), and jobs for a small crew for only the period of construction (not to mention padding Mob pockets).
How about new schools? Well, we already have schools and school construction for the students in the school system, and it is insanely expensive--about $45 million for an elementary school, more for a high school. Additional schools would need someone to use them--perhaps taxpayers can pay for free college or graduate education in them? Not only do we then undercut existing colleges and universities that need to make ends meet, but now we have added even MORE overeducated workers to the bloated labor pool.
I'm always surprised when liberals advocate "Trickle Down Economics," with the government doing the trickling down. Fact is, we can't do another New Deal, because our government has been so financially irresponsible for so long that it already survives only by printing more billions in fiat currency (while adding to a debt equal to the entire GDP).
There is ONE way to improve our economy, and that is to do a HUGE tax cut for everyone making under $250,000 a year. With people able to spend their own money to improve their lives, rather than Washington wasting it and funneling it to either the ultra rich and the very poor, we'd see a big rebound in local economies. And best of all, EVERYONE WINS, and everything was voluntary.
During the recession corporate terrorists learned that they can pare their workforce down to a minimum, and over-work them to death, and make even more profits.
Now, even though their coffers of profits are literally over-flowing, they will happily funnel the extra money into even higher salaries for their top executives instead of hiring back the necessary workers they need.
Okay, I guess you would rather have healthcare be the responsibility of the employer and have them shoulder the brunt of the cost making it harder for business owners to compete, expand, and start up.
no, what i want is for REAL health care reform. instead of forcing everyone into a particular package, there should be options. instead of forcing health care insurance companies to set up a complete office in every state, lets let them consolidate like other insurance companies are allowed to do so that everyone competes, which lowers rates for everyone how buys health insurance. i want the federal government OUT of the health insurance industry as much as possible, especially in the regulation of health insurance. obamacare now has something like 22,000 pages of regulations that health insurance companies and healthcare providers have to follow. and the feds are only getting started. and remember that every regulation that any government agency puts on any business costs money to comply with. doctors offices are having to put people on the payroll just to deal with the regulations, and that forces doctors to charge more money for their services.
in the end, having the employer pay for part of an employees health insurance works as long as the government stops piling on and jamming crap down our throats. back off the regulaitons, and let the insurance companies compete for our dollars, and you will find the cost of insurance will come way down.
ZBascailly very small buisness overr 25 is lokig at much higher cost with new mandates i healthcare insurance ;so they are doing more with less. They alos now are more dependent on foreign sales and services to make a profit. that is why porfits do not follow the economy in US any more nor does the markets.
no, what i want is for REAL health care reform. instead of forcing everyone into a particular package, there should be options. instead of forcing health care insurance companies to set up a complete office in every state, lets let them consolidate like other insurance companies are allowed to do so that everyone competes, which lowers rates for everyone how buys health insurance. i want the federal government OUT of the health insurance industry as much as possible, especially in the regulation of health insurance. obamacare now has something like 22,000 pages of regulations that health insurance companies and healthcare providers have to follow. and the feds are only getting started. and remember that every regulation that any government agency puts on any business costs money to comply with. doctors offices are having to put people on the payroll just to deal with the regulations, and that forces doctors to charge more money for their services.
in the end, having the employer pay for part of an employees health insurance works as long as the government stops piling on and jamming crap down our throats. back off the regulaitons, and let the insurance companies compete for our dollars, and you will find the cost of insurance will come way down.
You do know that Universal Healthcare can actually have options with different types of packages.
Having the employers take the brunt of health insurance doesn't work and all it does is add cost to employers. Even if you got rid of all the regulations, health insurance would still be costly for the employer, unless of course you got rid of regulations so that employers didn't need to provide insurance. Then you would just have an increase of working Americans without health insurance.
As for me, I am not for any more groveling before millionaires. It seems like the recession, caused by the rich, destroyed the lives of the working and middle classes, and the rich are back to their same old whining victim schtick. That ain't right. Our government is the only thing that can possibly balance the power advantage of the plutocracy. If it are just another arm of their power, we will get exactly what we have gotten.
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