Obama's Jobs Plan: The Most Timely and Targeted Stimulus Yet

[n2doc]

- Jim Tankersley

When the Obama administration designed its first economic stimulus measure in 2009, it tried to turn a double play of rescuing the country from recession while also advancing key liberal policy goals such as moving from fossil fuels to clean energy.

The stimulus proposals Obama announced on Thursday, in contrast, are tightly focused on one thing: job creation. They are, to borrow an Obamaland phrase, more targeted and more timely jolts for economic activity than the Recovery Act was in the depths of the Great Recession.

If you believe that the biggest reason America sits today on the brink of a double-dip recession is a nosedive in aggregate demand--a vacuum of consumer spending that the federal government can and should fill in order to prop up recovery--then the best news from Obama's speech was that the president appears to have learned from his past Keynesian mistakes.

For sheer stimulative purposes, the "American Jobs Act" Obama announced before a joint session of Congress appears much better designed than the Recovery Act.

more
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/09/obamas-jobs-plan-the-most-timely-and-targeted-stimulus-yet/244817/

[joeybee12]

1. OMG!

:puke:

[Inuca]

2. ????????? n/t

[lillypaddle]

3. You're something else n/t

[Phx_Dem]

4. What an astute observation. You're obviously a deep thinker.

:eyes:

[TwilightGardener]

6. Eat some bad sausage?

[bvar22]

5. Glad to see that the Business Section of The Atlantic

...supports this plan.
They have always had a deep humanitarian concern for the Working Class & The Unemployed.

It should also get high marks from the Chamber of Commerce.
They wrote most of it.


Chamber of Commerce APPROVED!

http://www.industryweek.com/articles/u-s-_chamber_of_commerce_unveils_job-creation_plan_25482.aspx?Page=2&SectionID=3


You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.

Solidarity!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Honeycombe8]

8. Approval is approval, and this is a good sign that Wall Street MIGHT push Congress...

to pass it, if only for the tax cuts. They probably don't care about the other parts.

This is good. Nothing gets a politician to vote a certain way more than a "suggestion" by a big campaign donor.

[MH1]

24. Try studying a little Keynesian economics.

[GeorgeGist]

7. Rec'd ...

so folks will read reply #5.

[FrenchieCat]

9. So what about the fact that Unions also approve of the plan....?

do they get shoved under the bus, simply because there are parts of the plan that the Chamber of Commerce agrees with?

I am self employed, and do accounting for small businesses. There is one in particular which employs about 100 employees, most who are students at a nearby college.


The payroll tax holiday for employers would be limited to the first 5 million dollars in payroll.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2011/09/08/economists-react-gauging-impact-of-obama-jobs-proposal/


So this employer would save $42,000+ for the year with the Payroll tax cut proposed. that is an employer that would hire additional employees, and meeting payroll is their biggest burden. Why would it be bad for them to receive an incentive to hire? They are not a large corporation...they are three people that started a catering company.

I have business that I do accounting for, and currently, they have an offer and compromise sitting to be processed with the IRS, because they got behind on the payroll taxes. If they aren't able to negotiate something reasonable for them to pay, they will have to shut their doors. They employ about 40 employees. Those employees would become unemployed.

So why is helping small businesses so bad now? Why the extreme?

[bvar22]

10. No employer is going to hire somebody...

...just because he gets a Tax Break.
There is a reason these people are successful...they aren't STUPID.
The ONLY reason an employer is going to hire anyone is if there is a DEMAND,
and his current staff can't handle that demand.
THEN that employer is going to hire somebody whether he gets a tax break or not.

Can you imagine ANY "Job Creator" (sic) saying,
"Hey, I got a big tax break.
Think I'll go out and hire somebody I don't need!"

If an employer can't meet his payroll,
he has other business management problems that
a Payroll tax Break isn't going to solve.

Cutting the Payroll Tax IS an attack on Social Security,
and it directly connects funding for Social Security to The Deficit,
legitimizing Republican claims that Social Security is part of the deficit problem.

Payroll Tax Holiday Directly Connects Social Security to The Deficit

No "DEMOCRAT" would EVER marginalize funding for Social Security by treating it like it is a nuisance that we can call a "HOLIDAY",
like a Free Day Off from School!!!
:party:

Real Democrats would be fighting FOR RAISING THE CAP.
If you could ask FDR, or Harry Truman, or LBJ whether they thought the Payroll tax Holiday was a good idea,
what do you think their answer would be?
If you are having trouble with an answer, this photo is a hint.


Demanding that the RICH Pay their Fair Share (Raise the CAP) has over an 80% Approval from the American People,
and would protect Social Security indefinitely.
Thats the solution.!




Solidarity!
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[Dawgs]

11. Get ready for all of the usual "arguments".

'You're only helping the Republicans',
'If you would only do whatever Obama wants',
'You want Obama to fail'
'You hate the President'
'blah, blah, blah'

I think you understand.

[FrenchieCat]

13. The arguments are usual, because they are true.

Just because you don't like the finger pointing at you,
that's too damn bad.

[FrenchieCat]

12. Providing tax breaks to employees will provide businesses the opportunity

to have demand....it's a cycle.

So you are incorrect in your assumed assertion.

I am very familiar with small business, and those are who we are talking about....
and lack of understanding of anything other than what you choose to understand is
actually dangerous. And the only thing that you will succeed in doing is bringing
in a Republican administration that would do what you most fear, and they would link
up whatever they feel like linking up in order to make their case, no matter the facts.

Of course, you'd have it that nothing is done other than nationalizing businesses,
and putting their ceos in jail... which is why you are what I consider as an extreme
naysayer....always looking for the flaws in everything, and never actually informing
folks in any way other then causing them to feel down and out and full of nothing
but cynicism.

In other words, your agenda is not one of being helpful or useful,
as much as one trying to dispirit as many people as would
have it.

[Dawgs]

14. Not according to the people that work for these small businesses.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=1907920&mesg_id=1908382

But I guess that you know more than all of them... maybe because Obama said so.

[FrenchieCat]

15. I service multiple small businesses ......

not a two person situation that needs no employees. I also own a small business,
but mine is not the kind of business that I'm talking about either.....

I'm talking about small repair shops, Restaurants, medium size non-chain grocery stores, bars, small hotels, speciality contractors like roofing and glass installation (as I service all of these types of businesses) and those would hire if they had increased demand, and substantial benefits to hiring additional employees that would be needed with the added demand.

I think that some of those folks in that thread don't know what in the hell they are talking about,
but then, I believe the same thing about you.

[Dawgs]

16. So let me get this straight. Because Obama said so and your experience is better than others...

..those other people, who you don't even know, are full of shit? Even though those other people have real life experience, just like you, working with small businesses.

Is that about right?

[FrenchieCat]

18. The issue is that the extended larger payroll tax holiday for employEES

will allow folks to keep more money in their pockets...which they will then spend for the most part.

The businesses who are on the receiving end of the money being spent, will hire in order to fill the demand, and will do so especially if they have incentives, rather than to have their employees already hired work overtime. If they can get a $4,000 credit for hiring an employee that has been out of work for more than 6 months, then that is beneficial and makes economic sense, and so they will do just that.

It is Demand-side economics 101, which isn't a secret.

Demand-side economics is first and foremost a means of ridding an economy of a recession and stimulating economic growth while preventing inflation. It is meant as a control on both expansion and retraction, to keep an economy in a stable zone. The idea is that to stimulate growth, a government should lower taxes on the middle and working class, and increase government spending.
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-demand-side-economics.htm

Does that make those folks commenting full of shit? No, it makes them not wanting to see the whole of the current proposal, and only taking a piece of it, and discussing it in a vacuum. The Job proposal
is not only about incentives for businesses to hire, as the entire plan has to be looked upon as a whole....which they have decided not to do for the convenience of their own closed minded opinion generated by their automatic dislike of this President and his policies.

[Vattel]

19. If the tax breaks for employees would yield greater demand,

then why do we need tax breaks for employers as well? Would the employer tax cuts add that much more stimulus to make them worth the loss of revenue? It's a genuine question. I don't know enough about economics to know the answer to this question, or to evaluate Obama's job proposals in general.

[FrenchieCat]

20. There is no lost revenue, because employees are hired due to increased revenue

generated by people taking home more pay, and therefore having more money to spend,
and thereby giving various businesses more revenue.

If a working poor earning minimum wage earns (in CA that's $8.00 per hour X 80) approx $1,280 per month (for a 4 week month, more for a 5 week month), and is now taking home 3.2% more than he was last year, that's about $41.00, and that money will not be saved. That person will perhaps purchase more food, like an extra chicken, or those cookies that they may not have bought before, or take his wife and kids to a restaurant (perhaps the wife is working too, so now that's an extra $82.00 for the household). That's increased demand on the grocer and his suppliers, or for the restaurant...and therefore, increased revenues. No one expects the businesses to hire just for the sake of hiring, but if there have incentives that will point to hiring as being more cost effective then that's what a business will do.

And yes, it would be more beneficial for small businesses to hire new employees than to pay overtime at time and 1/2 to an already existing employees, especially if there are incentives offered that would initially cover a few paychecks for that new employee and then some. Some companies have also been going through temp programs but this is not cost effective, as they charges exorbitant fees, and if they think they will be paid an additional $4,000 to hire as opposed to paying for a temporary one, they will do it.

The incentives are there to make it more beneficial to hire, in terms of the bottomline,
which is why they are called incentives.

[Vattel]

22. Thanks. That is very helpful.

[whosinpower]

21. Wait.....raising the cap on SS

won't create jobs either.

But - I recall Obama stating that the rich should pay their fair share during the speech too. You did not hear it?...he talked of Warren Buffet begging them to make him pay more as it was not fair that his secretary paid a higher percentage than he did.

I understand where you are trying to go - to preserve SS.
But we are talking about getting money into the hands of workers- and I beleive that the only way to do so with a recalricant, idiotic GOP congress - is with a payroll type stimulus.

Getting more money into the hands of those who will spend it on consumer items is the only way to increase demand - and that is the only way to increase jobs.

Will it be enough? Or - after a decade of lagging wages, high foreclosures, eroding and vanishing savings and 401's and attack after attack on the middle class - will they just hang onto that newfound income....that is the big question.

[MH1]

25. Employers will hire people because product demand is up.

Demand will be up because there is more money in the pockets of people who will actually spend it (as opposed to the people republicans like to give tax breaks to).

Ever hear of supply / demand curve? Do you know WHY 'supply-side economics' is a bad joke?

Gah, we need to make Economics 101 a required class for all high-schoolers.

[DCBob]

17. agreed... targeted and timely are the key.

hope to God it gets passed... this country needs it bad.

[GeorgeGist]

23. Sub prime load.

Triangulate that!

[Exilednight]

26. Tax vuts are not stimulus. Never have been, never will be. n/t