Every dollar spent on unemployment benefits generates real economic growth. The Congressional Budget Office says you get $1.90 back for every dollar of unemployment compensation. Mark Zandi at Moody’s says you get $1.61. The Labor Department says $2.
Any way you add it up, it provides an immediate boost to the local economy because the unemployed spend that money in their communities. Want to help a local small business or a small chain like Bi-Mart, Grocery Outlet or Food4Less? Extend unemployment compensation to jobless workers.
Tax cuts for the wealthiest folks in town, people who still have income and savings accounts, are windfall gains that will more likely be stashed away in that savings account or perhaps spent on a vacation somewhere else, maybe not even in the U.S.
Don’t get me wrong. I have no problem with people taking vacations and going wherever they want to go. I’m just saying that if you really honestly want to improve the economy you should extend unemployment benefits and end the tax cuts for the rich.
It’s not only the smart thing to do, it’s the right thing to do if you really care about people who are down and out in any American community—rural, urban, suburban, ex-burb, whatever label you choose. Rep. Greg Walden apparently doesn’t know that. His local office number is 541-389-4408 and a toll free call from the 541 area code can be made to 1-800-533-3303. Give him a call.
This article appears in Dec 9-15, 2010.
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This is the same lame economic argument I have heard all over the liberal media of late. Lets be logical. Doesn’t it really sound too hard to believe? A job will produce much more for the local economy than unemployment benefits. Not only does the wage primarly return to to the local economy but the person working is no longer taking money from the government and increasing budget deficits that devalue the very dollar we all get paid. Statistically, one-third of people get jobs the moment their unemployment benefits expire. So extending benefits will slow down that process. You still need compassion for people on unemployment but shouldn’t 99 weeks be enough?
Also, if wealthy americans put money in savings or go on a vacation we all benefit. Those savings are reinvested in businesses that grow the economy and create jobs so people can come off unemployment. Those travelors will come to Bend and spend money thus generating demand for more products and services. Isn’t Bend a travel destination anyway? The worst thing we could do is encourage people to stay on unemployment rather than getting them back to work to spur the economy.
The real issue here is that liberals hate big businesses and want to redistribute wealth to the poor. That sounds all good and compassionate but when you burn a business you are damaging the very engine that provides a wage to the poor. If you replace that engine with taxation and inefficient government management it will do more to shrink the pie that all of us share. Let the free market make these decisions not government. I care about people and want them to get back to work, thats why I want to see a local business flurish, with low taxes and strong investments from the wealthy, so they can add more workers. Lets use basic econmic policy not your ideological, feel-good experiments.
“Want to help a local small business or a small chain like Bi-Mart, Grocery Outlet or Food4Less? Extend unemployment compensation to jobless workers.”
Or Walmart, eh Funke?
Reality check!!
The basic rule of business development and expansion is that growth is a response to an increase in demand. If people who buy do not have money that demand shrinks or remains static. No new jobs.
Reality check!!
Manufacturing has to a large extent been moved off shore to Asia by the very people who maximized their wealth not through innovation and product improvement, but cost cutting. How does the USA labor market compare to, first, Mexico, then Korea, India, Pakistan and Indonesia, and now, that mother lode of bottomless cheap labor, China? Don’t blame the unions, that perpetual buggaboo of the conservative defenders of job flight. In the 1970’s union membership never involved more than 25% of the workforce and today, even with public employee representation,is only about half that. It was simply a decision to maximize profits the easy way and not worry about the consequences. “The business of a business is to maximize profits.” Given this–where does one think the ‘new’ jobs are going to appear. Which Asian country will reap the benefits of the tax cuts?
Reality check!!
The tax cuts are a payback to the wealthy for their support of the very politicians who were re-elected (Over 80% in both the house and senate last month.)
Reality check!!
The American public is getting the government and economy they deserve because they are too involved with their flat screen plasmas, X-boxes, and cell phone tweets to find out what is really going on around them. i.e. Over 90% of Americans inherit NOTHING. FACT!
Only 3% of Americans inherit $50,000 or more. FACT! Eliminating the ‘Death Tax’ is a vital issue for all Americans! HUH!
An issue like this could be framed the way it has and then accepted by the majority of Americans as vital and unfair to us all only if the general public was too lazy and stupid to care. How many more issues are sold an accepted in like fashion?
Reality Check!!
Time for the haves to realize that sooner or later the have-nots grow tired and weary. The Romans found out. The Bourbons found out. The European communists found out. Where are the colonial empires of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries? What is happening is not sustainable–regardless of the capacity to suppress. A willing idiocracy is no substitute for a participatory democracy.