Op-Ed: More Government Spending Isn't What Western New Yorkers Need

Op-Ed

One year ago, leaders in Washington said they could prevent unemployment from exceeding 8 percent and create jobs immediately. So they asked taxpayers for $787 billion to spend on an economic "stimulus" bill.

One year after the "stimulus" became law, America is $787 billion more in debt to China and other foreign countries, national unemployment is at 10 percent, approximately 3 million more Americans have lost their jobs, and the federal government has grown to unprecedented levels, all while Western New York communities and families outside of Washington have continued to struggle.

In fact, the only city in our entire country that saw any significant job growth in the year since the "stimulus" bill passed was the center of government -- Washington, DC.

One year later, it is clear this spending plan did not work.

I supported a plan that would have created about twice as many jobs as promised by the "stimulus" at half the cost, according to the same method of analysis used by the White House. Like many Western New Yorkers, I have always believed that we should be helping taxpayers keep more of what they earn and give small businesses new tools to invest in themselves and hire more workers.

At a time when we should encourage small businesses to grow and reduce costly government mandates, leaders in Washington instead chose to grow our government and add hundreds of billions onto our already record high debt (currently at $12.3 trillion and rising). To make matters worse, according to the Administration's recently released budget, America will rack up $5 trillion in new debt over the next five years alone, and make permanent some of the failed programs included in the "stimulus."

As a leading member of the House Republican Economic Recovery Working Group, I have crafted meaningful legislation to create jobs and help small businesses prosper (you can view my economic recovery plan on my website at www.chrislee.house.gov). Many of these commonsense ideas have been proposed to President Obama based on his statements that he will welcome worthy ideas from both sides of the aisle.

From spending hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars on a "stimulus" bill that did not work to voting to raise our national debt limit by an additional $1.9 trillion, leaders in Washington continue to prove they are out of touch with the difficult times Americans are facing.

Western New Yorkers are no strangers to doing more with less -- it's time the federal governments do the same and stop spending taxpayers' money on growing the government.

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