Unemployment numbers keep getting worse, not better according to this report from McClatchy:

First-time filings for unemployment benefits rose last week by 12,000, reaching 500,000 for the week, the highest level since last November. Economists had expected the claims to drop. […]

Obama proposes making the Bush tax cuts permanent for individuals who earn less than $200,000 a year and couples who make less than $250,000. He’d let the tax reductions expire for those who earn more than that.

Republicans — and some Democrats — want to make all the tax cuts permanent or at least to extend them as long as the economy remains fragile. They fear that a tax increase would hurt recovery.

Indeed, the CBO said the economy and jobs outlook would be helped under one scenario, in which most tax reductions_ except the lower rates for the wealthy — were extended and federal spending restrained.

Well, we all know that neither of those is going to happen. Republicans won’t abandon their wealthiest donors to help out everyone else. The GOP will continue to block extension of tax cuts for the middle class unless the rich get theirs too.

So either all the Bush tax cuts will expire unless the Democrats cave and extend all of them. Of course extending tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans (those with incomes in excess of $200,000 for individuals or $250,000 for families) will only increase future deficits more, but that won’t stop Republicans from claiming the deficit is all the fault of Democrats and “entitlement programs” (you know, Social Security and Medicare which are subject to a separate, regressive tax).

As for spending, thanks in large part to the costs of our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, deficits will remain high (and no, our involvement in Iraq isn’t over when you still have 50,000 US troops there). The companies that make bullets, bombs and drones and electrocute soldier in showers (Hi KBR!) will continue to do well, but everyone else will suffer from lack of spending.

As this chart from Gallup shows consumer spending is down from last year at this time. Without some easing of credit for small business or government investment in rebuilding and modernizing our infrastructure (updating the electrical grid so that it loses less electricity, spending on or tax credits for new green technologies like wind and solar, fixing bridges and roads, investing in education, transportation, etc.) new jobs will be hard to come by.

If I were running the Democratic campaigns for the Fall I would be emphasizing that we are falling behind other developed nations because we refuse to INVEST in the infrastructure and new technologies that will secure more jobs now and better paying jobs in the future.

However, it seems the Dems are falling into the GOP trap of having the debate over the Bush tax cuts for the rich and corporate welfare that allows jobs to be outsourced overseas which we know failed to generate job growth in the past according to that commie rag The Wall Street Journal.

President George W. Bush entered office in 2001 just as a recession was starting, and is preparing to leave in the middle of a long one. That’s almost 22 months of recession during his 96 months in office.

His job-creation record won’t look much better. The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton’s administration and only slightly better than President George H.W. Bush did in his four years in office. […]

Because the size of the economy and labor force varies, we also calculate in percentage terms how much the total payroll count expanded under each president. The current President Bush, once taking account how long he’s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records.

Three million piddling jobs created in 8 years? Remember, this came during a time when Bush increased government spending to private companies and to pay for our massive wars in the Middle East. It was the worst job creation during an economic recovery (from the recession created after the Tech stock bubble burst in 2000) ever. So why on God’s Green Earth would any Democrat talk about tax cuts as being the panacea to our nation’s job woes?

Every time a Republican says tax cuts create jobs a Democrat should be waving that Wall Street Journal article in his or her face. Every time they say we need to extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans we should be saying that isn’t going to create jobs for the unemployed because the record proves it.

Bush’s job creation didn’t even keep up with the rise in the workforce population.

When George W. Bush came into office in 2001, there were 215 million Americans who might want work. By the end of his administration, in 2008, the population had grown again, and there were 234 million Americans suitable for America’s labor force. The number of people who might want jobs had grown by another 19 million people.

Unfortunately, 19 million jobs were not created during the Bush years. Instead, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a net gain of only 2 million jobs were created. This means that during the eight years of the Bush administration, only a year’s worth of new jobs were created.

And that means that by the time George W. Bush left office, the United States was seven years behind in the number of jobs it needed to keep its citizens working.

In addition, during the halcycon years of the Bush tax cuts, 8.3 MILLION more people fell below the poverty line during his eight years. Median incomes fell from $52,500 at the end of 2000 (Clinton’s last year)to an inflation adjusted $50,303 in 2008 That’s a drop of 4.2 per cent.

As Ronald Brownstein, the political director of Atlantic Media, commented on the 2009 Census Bureau report:

On every major measurement, the Census Bureau report shows that the country lost ground during Bush’s two terms. While Bush was in office, the median household income declined, poverty increased, childhood poverty increased even more, and the number of Americans without health insurance spiked. By contrast, the country’s condition improved on each of those measures during Bill Clinton’s two terms, often substantially.

So who benefited from the tax cuts? Not people who needed jobs, not most workers, not poor people. No, the people who most benefited from the tax cuts were MILLIONAIRES and BILLIONAIRES:

Families earning more than $1 million a year saw their federal tax rates drop more sharply than any group in the country as a result of President Bush’s tax cuts, according to a new Congressional study.

The study, by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, also shows that tax rates for middle-income earners edged up in 2004, the most recent year for which data was available, while rates for people at the very top continued to decline.

Based on an exhaustive analysis of tax records and census data, the study reinforced the sense that while Mr. Bush’s tax cuts reduced rates for people at every income level, they offered the biggest benefits by far to people at the very top — especially the top 1 percent of income earners.

So why are Democrats still talking about tax cuts? Eight years of tax cuts and Republican mismanagement cost us jobs, made health care more expensive or unavailable for more Americans, substantially increased poverty and lowered incomes for most Americans. That’s the message Democrats should be speaking out about loudly and clearly at every campaign stop and in every speech and in every ad they run this year.

But will they?

0 0 votes
Article Rating