Issue Position: Jobs

Issue Position

I fully believe in the free market principles that are a bedrock of the Republican Party. However, I do not subscribe to the notion of trickle down economics or that tax breaks for corporations or the rich create jobs. I have heard many times that tax breaks for businesses allow them to hire more employees. Hogwash. I believe that jobs are created or eliminated as a result of supply and demand not by rich corporations or entrepreneurs - the so called "job creators." If people buy more products and services, employers must add employees to meet the demand. When people stop buying, supplies increase and jobs are cut.

The jobs bill that President Obama unveiled this fall with the promise of bold ideas was a huge disappointment. What he presented was more of the same stimulus ideas that failed to create sustained jobs with the first stimulus package. Investing in infrastructure, as the President suggested, is no different than bailing out corporations and banks. The government is choosing which sections of the economy to support and picking the winners and losers. If you're not a construction worker how is repairing a road any help to you?

My idea is one borrowed from President George W. Bush. In 2001 he signed the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act. Part of this act sent rebate checks to every taxpayer that filed a tax return for the previous year. If you remember, the rebate was $300 for single filers with no dependents, $500 for single parents, and $600 for married couples.

If we had taken the $750 Billion TARP dollars and divided it up among all the taxpayers instead of throwing it away in bailouts the American people would have decided with their spent dollars which corporations were strong enough to survive. From my simple calculations I found that there were 144,103,375 individual tax returns in 2009. Dividing $750 billion by the number of returns yields approximately $5,200.00 per taxpayer.

Link to tax return stats for 2009:

www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/10taxstatscard.pdf

My plan would have been to send each taxpayer a rebate check every six months for two years in decreasing amounts to jolt the economy. For example, if we had taken the $750 Billion TARP dollars and given it back to the taxpayers in decremental amounts of $2,000, $1,500, $1,000 and $500 every six months, each taxpayer would have received $5,000 over the course of two years and it would have provided a continuous stream of economic activity.

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