Obama’s “Stimulus”: Economic “Recovery” or Just a Lot of Money Stolen from Our Kids?
By Ken Falkenstein | Tuesday, June 7th, 2011 | PoliticsPresident Obama today claimed that his $1.3 trillion theft from our kids (including interest) in the guise of “stimulus” has led to an economic “recovery.” If the fact that we are not in a recovery is not sufficiently self-evident, the chart below puts the lie to this claim by showing Obama’s claims in 2009 of what the unemployment rates would be with and without his “stimulus” scheme and what the unemployment rates have been since it was passed:
Tags:
Contribute for Conservatism!
Share this post
About the author
Ken Falkenstein has been a staffer in the United States Senate and the Virginia House of Delegates. He has managed political campaigns. He was a military intelligence analyst in the U.S. Army in West Germany during the Cold War. He is currently a civil litigation attorney with Poole Mahoney, P.C. in Virginia Beach. But his concern for his kids' future is what most informs his writing.
We're 75% there! Thank you to everyone who has so far contributed! Just $2000 to go!
Comments
16 Responses to "Obama’s “Stimulus”: Economic “Recovery” or Just a Lot of Money Stolen from Our Kids?"
Obama will run as the Senator from Illinois against Paul Ryan and Bush43. It’s only June 2011 and Dems are already saying that seniors women and children will die if Repubs are elected and minorities will be enslaved. I think the only thing that will work is the attack on Paul Ryan.
Fairly ironic that a major aparty can shift from “deficits don’t matter” to “debt must be reduced now” in two years. What happened to faith in the growth of the economy to make debt manageable? Fact is, basing the soul of the party on the shoulders of Grover Norquist and the tea party is a very dangerous strategy. Yes, we have hit a rough patch based upon short term considerations, but the recovery continues on a solid foundation. Republicans leaders may have short memories, but Cheney’s comment wilol be remembered in the campaign.
Forbes: Jerry Della Femina, the Mad Men Ad Man, Has Shrugged
Della Femina’s reward? A president who says the rich are merely fortunate, and that they should hand over even more of their money so that the “compassionate” in Washington who’ve mostly never met a payroll, never built a business and never had their productivity measured by the marketplace can hand over their earnings to others. Some would call this theft, and that’s probably not a harsh enough description.
Class warriors such as President Obama embrace the classic fallacy of loving jobs while hating job creators, and in fostering an environment that penalizes the productive and the investment capital that funds their activities, Obama is unwittingly directing his cruel egalitarianism at those who aren’t as skillful, and who don’t work as hard as Della Femina.
Our nation has prospered the most when all have participated in full employment and fair compensation. The Bush tax cuts have predominately benefitted the top 2% of our citizens who can know vacation in France and drink better wine. We need to put all our citizens to work and return to a progressive tax code that will be a significant part of reducing the deficit.
Mike,
We have a progressive tax code. Almost 50% of all filers pay NO (zero, zip, nada, as in none) federal income tax. How do you get more “progressive” than that? What we need is an environment that promotes economic activity. That means making, selling and buying not taking and giving. Your vision of class warfare is a Marxist manifestation as is I fear your vision of the perfect economic system. It’s been tried; it failed, and brought misery to countless millions.
Refugee,
I would call that not very progressive at all. I would think that only the lower class should escape paying any income taxes (the lower third?), the middle class (middle third) should pay some with upper class (upper third) paying more. I would add that there is a strong argument that the rates for the upper third should be further graduated because some are filthy rich while those barely squeaking into the upper third really are not that rich.
I also think that if payroll (Social Security and Medicare) taxes are included, many of those in the lower half you are speaking of are not actually escaping federal tax free, however that argument then gets complicated. Payroll taxes are for insurance, not to fund the general fund.
Jamie Jacob,
Your statements about “never meeting a payroll” and “fostering an environment that penalizes the productive and the investment capital that funds their activities” is misleading at best but more truthfully might be described as deceptive if we are only talking about a progressive income tax. If a small business is structured as my own is, they pay income taxes only on the gross profits and not the net receipts. If their profits are only such that they fall into the lower half Refugee talks about, they pay zero income taxes just like someone working on the payroll.
I will admit there is a host of taxes and fees some businesses have to pay that are often independent of how much money you make. I am just getting a business started and my life savings are taking a big hit in the fees, permits, etc I must pay just to get started before I have even earned a dime.
Fact is, restore tax rates to where they were before the Bush tax cuts, when the nation was prosperous and our budget was in surplus, and most of our so called “problem with the debt” simply goes away. Couple that with needed curtailments in the rate of growth of many programs, and the needed cutting of some, and suddenly, the republicans don’t have an issue on which to run in 2012. So to whose benefit is it to stay in “the world as we know it will end” crisis mode?
Little David,
Do you really want to equate payroll deductions and income tax? Vary dangerous ground for a liberal. But we can go there if you wish.
As for tax rates on the middle third and upper third; who are you (or President Obama) to decide what constitutes rich? A fire chief and head nurse married and living in NYC. He’s a Lieutenant Colonel in the National Guard. She tutors pre-med students. They live in Brookline and rent out a small vacation home upstate she inherited from her parents. According to you, Mike, and the President; because they make over $250,000 a year, they are rich and don’t contribute enough to society. Sorry I don’t buy it. If you want economic prosperity you lower taxes, reduce the size of government and unleash a nation of doers.
LittleDavid,
Factor in foodstamps, medicaid, EIC, and child tax credit, many of that lower third are getting paid money because they are poor. We, as a nation, have chosen to support them. So no federal income tax and get money that is not yours. Seems progressive to me. I guess we could go ahead and throw in the payroll taxes, since they really aren’t insurance, but a pyramid scheme.
Mike Barrett,
Do you have a source that shows how getting rid of the Bush tax cuts get rid of most of the so called debt problem? That would be interesting data to consider.
I am still amazed that we spent all that money even though we thought that with either spending it or not, we would still end up in the same place in 6 years.
According to every major commission that has reviewed this problem of debt and deficit, it will take a combination of additional revenue, reductions in the rate of growth of expenditures, and full recovery so the national economy reaches healthy growth rates, to reduce the percentage of revenue and expenses to about 20% of GNP. This will not happen immediately; it took a decade to get away from surplus to the kind of deficits we have today. Any politician who claims we can do this simply with cuts to the safety net is simply not realistic, pragmatic, not truthful.
Socialists: nice hijack. The article is about unemployment and you guys start an argument about taxes and tax rates. The article points out the dismal failure that was the Obama “stimulus” plan. The fact that Obama went for it shows how stupid he really is. Stimulus plans don’t work, they never work, they never have worked. Did I mention that stimulus plans don’t ever work? So the handlers stand his pretty face up in front of a teleprompter and he reads the crap they want him to shovel at the American people: “If we go deeper into debt, the economy will recover. The fact that we’re in the middle of a deleveraging doesn’t matter.”
Morons.
On the subject of taxes, when you tax something you get less of it. When you create demand for (subsidize) something, you get more of it. So let’s tax productive economic activity and pay people to stay home and do nothing.
Good grief you people are stupid.
Ken,
What happened to your latest post about Senator Norment and his William and Mary compensation package?
I prefer to ignore posts that call people names like moron, stupid, or socialist. So I won’t take issue with the poster, just the idea in the post. Yes, the recovery has gone slower that hoped, and one of the headwinds not frequently mentioned, but felt locally much more than nationally, is the loss of employment in the public sector in state and local government. The firing of employees in the public sector may make Governors feel good, but the effect on local economies is extremely negative. Some jobs needed to go, but as we face the need to increase revenue, decrease expenditures, and stimulate the economy to full employment, we need to remember the inter relationships between the three imperatives.
Refugee,
I am not a liberal, I am a moderate. You might call me a liberal, but liberals call me a conservative.
As for who am I to decide who should pay more under a progressive tax system? I am just one voter, with one vote expressing my opinion. However I will note that ever since an income tax was first imposed under President Abraham Lincoln to help pay for the costs of the Civil War, the income tax has been progressive in nature. I will further stake my claim that a progressive tax code is part of the American Way and that a pure flat tax would just be downright un-American.
Jamie Jacoby,
As for the hijack, you posted on the subject of taxes before I did (yours was number three – go back and read it) and I responded to what you posted. If anyone hijacked it, it was you.
Leave your response