How's the Economy Doing?

[vman]

Vman had several foreshadowing posts/predictions about econonic peril when Barry took office! Well folks it's bad & not getting better. In April, the private sector added 218,000 jobs. In May, the private sector added only 41,000 jobs. That is exactly the opposite pattern from a normal economic recovery.

Normally, in the depths of a severe recession, the recovery accelerates month by month as confidence recovers, businesses invest and consumers come back into the market.

The shocking numbers for May (an over 80% decline in new private-sector job creation) combined with the fallout from the European fiscal crisis and the economic costs of the BP-Obama oil disaster in the Gulf will further slow down the economy.

These indicators suggest that there is a real danger of a second downward leg in the recession.

Amazingly, Barry actually adopted the position that these dismal economic numbers were encouraging, saying "The economy's getting stronger by the day," and a sign his policies are working.

To be clear, it will take 292,000 new jobs added every month until 2015 to get back to 5% unemployment. For the economy to remain flat, it would need to add 125,000 jobs a month.

Considering that the census jobs are all temporary, the data suggests that the economy became weaker in May, not stronger, as the President claimed.

This blindness to reality is dangerous because it is a sign the Democrats will continue to follow job-killing policies. Here are some suggestions (which are not creating govt' jobs) that would help the economy:

-Reducing the payroll tax by half for 2010 to provide immediate liquidity for companies and employees;

-Eliminating the capital gains tax to encourage investment in new companies;

-Reducing the corporate tax rate to 12.5%, to make us competitive globally;

-Permanently eliminating the death tax so small businesses and family farms can continue creating jobs for future generations;

-Providing immediate business expensing so American workers have the best equipment and are the most productive.

[Goodwill]

Careful vman dear leader is going to kick your **** if you keep making sense

[Lemmy]

The Victory at Too Big to Fail: At the moment when Wall Street was on its knees, we decided to bypass serious reform. Instead, we rebuilt Wall Street, using taxpayer money and guarantees - more than $10 trillion worth. We let bankers use our bailout money to pay themselves $150 billion in bonuses -- at a moment when over 29 million Americans were jobless or forced into part-time jobs. We allowed the top hedge fund managers to walk off with over $900,000 an hour (not a typo) in 2009. Windfall profits taxes? No. In fact we let hedge fund honchos pay an extra-low tax rate by calling their income "capital gains." We didn't restore Glass-Steagall, we didn't break up "too big to fail" financial institutions. In fact the biggest banks became even bigger, courtesy of the U.S. government.



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/les-leopo ... 08703.html

Dean Baker: We used to have a 50 percent tax rate in the 50’s and 60’s when the economy had its most prosperous period, so I think you’re pretty hard-pressed to make the case that taxes are smothering the economy […] [T]he idea that somehow the tax rate, which is lower now than its been in years past, is strangling corporations, it doesn’t make any sense

Today, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report showing that between 1998 and 2005 “about two-thirds of corporations operating in the United States did not pay taxes.” Corporations have a “variety of reasons” for not paying, including “the cost of producing their goods, salary expenses and interest payments on their debt.”


This tax season will be kind to Bank of America and Wells Fargo: It appears that neither bank will have to pay federal income taxes for 2009.

Bank of America probably won't pay federal taxes because it lost money in the U.S. for the year. Wells Fargo was profitable, but can write down its tax bill because of losses at Wachovia, which it rescued from a near collapse.

The idea of the country's No. 1 and No. 4 banks not paying federal income taxes may be anathema to millions of Americans who are grumbling as they fill out their own tax forms this month. But tax experts say the banks' situation is hardly unique.



Read more: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2010/0 ... z0qYYBFfze

[Goodwill]

Careful Lemmy he may kick your a** after he sucks the life out of BP and the rest of private enterprise.