5 ways to help the economy in the United States

Some suggestions for the future President..

Published on October 7, 2004 By Draginol In Business

Here are 5 items that I would like any future President to consider if they want to actually help the United States economcially -- to create new jobs for Americans.

#1 Tort reform. People hear about company A suing company B all the time. Or an individual (or group of individuals) suing some company. I got personally sued this past year. Want to know why? Because my employer (I'm the CEO but it's a class C corporation) didn't agree to just let some company use our popular icon format without a license so they sued me personally as well as our company. Totally frivelous in my opinion (ultimately settled out of court but not before tens of thousands of dollars were spent).

#2 Lower taxes on companies. Make this up by eliminating some loopholes (such as John Edwards who creates an S corporation that pays him through dividends - clever but slimey and legal). Fewer taxes means more money to hire more people. One easy way would be to have C corporations have lower tax brackets if they net less than $1 million a year. Then you'd have less incentive to set up as an S corporation where a lot of these loopholes exist. BTW, Kerry's promise to raise taxes on those who make $200k or more is a bad idea.

#3 Make it easier to get work visas for foreign workers. Better to have them coming here to the United States than us contracting them overseas which is what we're currently stuck doing often times. Then they're here in the US buying things and contributing to the economy. We don't discriminate when we work with people. We want to work with the best and brightest regardless of their location. Whether that's Poland, UK, Italy or USA. But those who want to come to the US should be able to come here and the government should make that painless.

#4 Let small companies pool together for health care. In Europe, health care is free so I can just work with people in Europe who are just as qualified without having to pay for their health care. Let small businesses, the guys creating the jobs right now, band together to be able to get cheaper healthcare for their employees.

#5 Matching funds for college students who get a B average or better -- NOT means tested.

Comments (Page 2)

Madine

on Oct 08, 2004

If we want to emulate China, we can get rid of the minimum wage.

greenie

on Oct 08, 2004

"First off, the top 5% pay over half the taxes. "

Please - stop it. You're killing me.

This is a half-assed stat. I say half-assed not to be insulting, but because it only tells half a story.

So, you're telling us that if there are 100 tax payers, that pay a total of $1000 in taxes - 5 tax payers will kick in $500 and 95 will kick in the other $500.

So what!

Why can't you tell us the rest of the information? That would be this: what percent of the total unadjusted pure income pool do these 5 people pull in?

By implication, you would have us believe that people who make 5% of the money pay 50% of the taxes. Or maybe not. What would you like us to take away from this stat?

Draginol

on Oct 08, 2004

greenie: What's your point? The top 5% are paying most of the taxes. That's a fact. Raising the tax rate on th epeople who generate most of the wealth is foolish.

If I have a track team and I have one runner who wins most of the races, it's not a very smart thing to put weights on his legs in order for the others on the team to feel better if you're trying to win more for the team overall.

Dr Guy

on Oct 09, 2004

I agree if it's free many will blow it off, that's part of what has happend to the A+ program here. From my own experience I tried college at 19 and 24 years old only to quit after a semester both times. I started again at 29 and have stuck with it and even currently carry a 4.0 GPA. You have to be ready and at 18 I don't really believe that many kids are ready for it. especially if someone else is paying.

I totally agree with you. many at 18 are not ready. I guess I was because I earned it, yet I have friends who took 7-8 years to graduate (they were supported by parents), but they were smart enough, just not motivated enough.

I also have many co-workers who went into the military and then got a degree! They are not dumb (not by a far stretch as they did get the GI Bil Benefits!), but they were not ready at 18 either.

Each person is an individual. The Valedictorian of my duaghters class, flunked out his first year of college. Given that he graduated at the top of his class, he was not dumb! But he also was not ready. I hope he goes back. He is a very good kid.

Draginol

on Oct 09, 2004

Indeed. Paying for your own college (some or all) is key. I worked very hard in college because I couldn't afford to fail - I was paying the bills.

But I don't think that peopel need to pay 100% of their bills to feel responsible for succeeding.

greenie

on Oct 09, 2004

greenie: What's your point? The top 5% are paying most of the taxes. That's a fact. Raising the tax rate on th epeople who generate most of the wealth is foolish.

The point is that they are not paying a disproportional amount when compared to anyone else. When you throw out numbers like that you are trying to make the 5% look like they're getting screwed over. In fact they are not.

There are spreadsheets on the IRS site that summarize tax filings. Check 'em out sometime. The only problem I have with the IRS data is that it only includes 'adjusted gross income', so some of the income is already hidden - and who has the best accountants.

Shovelheat

on Oct 09, 2004

Agreed!

Draginol

on Oct 10, 2004

The point is that they are not paying a disproportional amount when compared to anyone else. When you throw out numbers like that you are trying to make the 5% look like they're getting screwed over. In fact they are not.

That's nonsense. The top 5% pay 54% of the taxes but they don't generate anywhere near 54% of the wealth created.

Besides, I'm not arguing that they're getting screwed over. I am saying that it's a bad policy to increase their taxes even further.

Cafin8ted

on Oct 11, 2004

My two cent's
1. Taxes are necessary, but should be an equal percentage - Loopholes suck (do we really want two lawyers in the white house)
2.Capatalism = competition, why do we try and handicap the winners with taxes

If I have a track team and I have one runner who wins most of the races, it's not a very smart thing to put weights on his legs in order for the others on the team to feel better if you're trying to win more for the team overall.

it seems like this is anti supply and demand to me, and I am not talking monopoly situations here.
3. Education is loosely defined. I do not want to discount the hard arduous work allot of people put into their education, however, hands on mixed with the ability to focus on a "job" says allot. I venture to say, that there allot of people attached to this discussion that have a good mix of "education". A sheep skin can get you into the same door as experience and the willingness to work hard. I have allot of "friend" who think that because they have a degree, they are "owed", and they don't even understand business or the stock market. All I am saying is that all forms of education, is what makes the world go around. My Father barely graduated high school, couldn't read until he was 30, but he can still put together an electrical system better than most, rewire an motor, work with high voltage and amperage. Where as I am scared stiff around that stuff. When you reverse the situation, he is scared to death to anything with a computer, and I love to tear into, rebuild, over-tweak them. So - I don't know what else to say there.
4."Presedentialy" speaking - How can John Kerry say that didn't plan right on how to end the war, when he voted for it, yet voted against the supplemental, and says that we need more troops to win the war, and doesn't want us to send any more troops. He says we have over 50% more troops in Iraq than in Afghanistan, yet we do not have enough troops in Iraq to win the peace??????? - How is that for education.
Just my two cents

Sam

on Oct 11, 2004

"In Europe, health care is free so I can just work with people in Europe who are just as qualified without having to pay for their health care."

Oh no it's not. Here in Estonia, which is one of the least tax-burdened countries in Europe, when you work, you pay 26% flat income tax (progressive and much higher in Western Europe), and your employer pays 33% social tax, which covers nationalized unemployment insurance and health insurance. Both are mandatory. So when you hire a European in one of the least taxed nations in Europe, and their paycheck is (let's use a nice round number) $1000 a month, you pay $365 income tax for them, plus another $450 social tax. That comes to a total of $1815. Gotta love that free health care.

Then again we have 0% corporate accrued income tax - you only pay income tax if you pay dividends, all reinvested profits are tax-free.

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!