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I would have picked something that cannot possibly be outsourced.
If they want to fix the country and the economy and create more jobs, they need to drastically down size government and privitize as much as they can.
Get rid of unions.
If private companies want unions, ridiculously over-paid union AND executive wages, ridiculous pension plans, and all the rest, I could care less. But then, when they get in financial trouble because they cannot support those same plans, they should go bankrupt and NOT be bailed out by the taxpayer.
NO company that gets its income and support from taxpayers should have unions. Taxpayers should NOT be held hostage by unions.
Tax laws should be changed so that any company that can prove that all design, engineering, material procurement, manufacturing, and is done in the United States, should pay NO business taxes.
“Social Security has also played a central role in the massive, six- decade Ponzi scheme known as US fiscal policy, which transfers ever- larger sums from the young to the old.
In so doing, Uncle Sam has assured successive young contributors that they would have their turn, in retirement, to get back much more than they put in. But all chain letters end, and the US’s is now collapsing.
The letter’s last purchasers – today’s and tomorrow’s youngsters – face enormous increases in taxes and cuts in benefits. This fiscal child abuse, which will turn the American dream into a nightmare, is best summarized by the $202 trillion fiscal gap discussed in my last column.
The gap is the present value difference between future federal spending and revenue. Closing this gap via taxes requires doubling every tax we pay, starting now. Such a policy would hurt younger people much more than older ones because wages constitute most of the tax base.
“Iraq – A $40 million prison sits in the desert north of Baghdad, empty. A $165 million children’s hospital goes unused in the south. A $100 million waste water treatment system in Fallujah has cost three times more than projected, yet sewage still runs through the streets
“As the U.S. draws down in Iraq, it is leaving behind hundreds of abandoned or incomplete projects. More than $5 billion in American taxpayer funds has been wasted — more than 10 percent of the some $50 billion the U.S. has spent on reconstruction in Iraq, according to audits from a U.S. watchdog agency.
That amount is likely an underestimate, based on an analysis of more than 300 reports by auditors with the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. And it does not take into account security costs, which have run almost 17 percent for some projects.”
This is all anyone should be talking about!!!!! Gov’t pensions are sucking the country dry a TRILLION dollars a year and growing!!!!!
Many states and cities are on the verge of bankruptcy and it seems like no one thinks that is bad for economy?
Cali is going to have a 60-80 BILLION state/local budget deficit for just next fiscal year? 0% chance Cali avoids Depression. NY, NJ, Illinois are right behind Cali….how can no one seem to think this is a disaster?
The worse the markets/real estate/bond returns get the higher the tax needed for pensions….do people get this?
If the DOW went to 1,000 next year YOUR LOCAL/STATE TAXES WOULD GO UP 5,000% TO PAY FOR THESE PENSIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Without pension reform we will collapse from the bottom up….higher and higher taxes, jails closed, prisoners released, way less cops, way less teachers, way less fire, skyrocketing unemployment!!!!
Consensus has been ratcheted down across the board. The economy is slowing to a snails pace and the jobs picture is getting worse.
September and October look weak.
Date Reports Time Previous Consensus
Monday
Aug. 30 Personal income 8:30 AM 0.00% 0.30%
Aug. 30 Consumer spending 8:30 AM 0.00% 0.30%
Aug. 30 Core PCE price index 8:30 AM 0.00% 0.01%
Aug. 30 Dallas Fed mfg Aug. 10:30 AM 5 5
Tuesday
Aug. 31 Case-Shiller index 9.00 AM FLAT
Aug. 31 Chicago PMI 9:45 AM 62.3 56
Aug. 31 Consumer confidence 10:00 AM 50.4 50
Aug. 31 FOMC minutes for Aug 2:00 PM
Wednesday
Sept. 1 MBA applications index 7:00 AM FLAT
Sept. 1 ADP private employ 8:15 AM 42,000 20,000
Sept. 1 ISM mfg index 10:00 AM 55.5 53.5
Sept. 1 Construction spending 10:00 AM 0.10% -0.60%
Sept. 1 N.A. car sales 4:00 PM 11.5 mln 11.5 mln
Thursday
Sept. 2 Unemployment claims 8:30 AM 473,000 470,000
Sept. 2 Non- Farm Productivity 8:30 AM -1.00% -2.00%
Sept. 2 Factory orders 10:00 AM -1.20% 0.40%
Sept. 2 Pending home sales 10:00 AM -2.60% -1.30%
Friday
Sept. 3 Nonfarm payrolls 8:30 AM -131,000 -105,000
Sept. 3 Private-sector payrolls 71,000 30,000
Sept. 3 Unemployment rate 9.50% 9.60%
Sept. 3 Average hourly earnings 0.20% 0.10%
Sept. 3 ISM non mfg services 10:00 AM 54.30% 53.20%
Why don’t Feds understand what it takes to create private sector jobs? Same reason they didn’t in the 30′s. This is not an “inventory recession,” like all have been since WW II. This isn’t a matter of too much inventory.
This is a credit collapse where not just households, but corporations, cities and states went too deep into debt during good times to survive during a downturn.
This takes years and a lot of pain to play out.
That is why, no matter what they do to try and create jobs, it is very hard to create any that aren’t tied to government spending that when pulled, immediately starts causing problems.
We also have the problem that boomers are starting to hit that age that they cut back on their spending. We have cities and states creating fear by their cuts in employment and spending that many private sector employees depend on.
President Obama has announced the recession is over; (See http://seeker401.wordpress.com/2009/07/31/the-recession-is-over-obama/ ) but he and his fellow Democrats fail to recognize the economic storm that is forming to create an even bigger financial crisis. They also failed to recognize how their policies to force banks to relax rules to unqualified lenders created the sub-prime mortgage crisis which led to the original economic crisis. When Republicans questioned the policies and attempted new regulations, Democrat Chris Dodd successfully threatened a filibuster to prevent any reform. See link to the 2008 financial crisis http://blog.upholdtraditionalvalues.com/2009/02/12/who-caused-this-economic-crisis–by-frank-aquila.aspx
While the American family and private businesses struggled to cut expenses, President Obama and the Democrat party has expanded the government and the federal budget by one trillion dollars and increased the national debt over 12 trillion dollars. With this government expansion and government take overs of our financial institutions, General Motor, and now health care, the government has grown while the private sector has shrunk.
How did this worldwide economic crisis begin and who is responsible for it? In 1996, a bipartisan Congressional Bill, H.R. 3019 was promoted and approved by President Bill Clinton to make changes to the 1977 Community Reinvestment Act signed into law by President Jimmy Carter. H.R. 3019 allowed Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, originally formed by the government to facilitate mortgage loans to homeowners, to accept mortgages from poor, low-income home buyers. The new requirement lowered the previous 25% down payment to zero down. In 1999, the requirements for approval of a mortgage by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were reduced even further to allow home buyers to obtain adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) based on the Federal Fund interest rate. There were some further changes as a result to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, a deregulation of the financial services industry.
