A college student's ideas on how to fix the economy

[Chisox08]

First raise the min. wage to at least $15 per hour and add an escalation clause to it so that the min. wage raises along with inflation.
Second a 70% tax on income that exceeds five million dollars. And have it go up in 5% increments topping of at 90% at yearly earnings that exceeds fifteen million dollars.
Force companies that does business in America to employ Americans.
Universal Health care. health care cost eats up a huge chunks of American income.
Close tax loop holes that allow the rich to hide money in foreign countries and not pay taxes on them.
End the Greenspan policy of maintaining an high enough worker insecurity to keep workers from asking for higher wages and benefits.
Rebuild and upgrade our crumbling infrastructure. This alone would give millions of Americans jobs.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. In other words, redistribution of weath and egalitarianism and democracy.

I like it.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

2. B+

[Chisox08]

3. Come on

That at least deserves an A- :-)

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

7. You forgot that all income up to the "poverty line" is tax exempt.

So close.

[Chisox08]

9. In the words of the great Philosopher Homer Simpson, "D'oh"

[Popol Vuh]

4. Good ideas but....

It doesn't address our main problem - our monetary system. The Federal Reserve has to be abolished.

n/t

[Chisox08]

6. I agree that the federal reserve needs to be abolished but....

A few baby steps in the right direction will help out right now.

[Popol Vuh]

8. agreed

:)

[Greyhound]

13. The problem with these 'baby steps is that they reduce the pain and allow the

sheeple to go back to their cuds. The Fed is the primary source of power for those that are intent on destroying the real "American Dream". As long as it exists they will be back over and over and over, forever.

[Chisox08]

16. That's a fight that we won't be able to wage until

We get a strong middle calss that is not afraid to take to the streets. Right now people can't afford to miss work to protest the ills of our government. Some people can't even afford to miss work to vote. Fix what we can right now and go after the fed. as soon as we can.

[Hippo_Tron]

27. Why? So monitary policy can be determined at the whims of elected politicians?

We turn monetary policy over to unelected officials for the same reason we turn judicial decisions over to unelected judges. It is impossible to make sound long term decisions when you are constantly running for re-election. And monetary policy is all about long term decisions.

And despite all of the bullshit libertarian propaganda out there that says otherwise, the Federal Reserve derives its power from Congress and Congress has the ability to reign it in any time it chooses.

[DailyGrind51]

5. Works for me!

[jtrockville]

10. I only disagree with one point....

I love your ideas - all but one: force companies that does business in America to employ Americans.

I'd change that a bit (mostly because I love cultural diversity, and I do love many things that come from around the globe). I think we should force companies that do business in America to pay living wages to their employees and no human rights abuses (in otherwords, fair trade as opposed to free trade), and I think we should force companies that do business in America to pay taxes in America regardless of where the island-with-a-PO-box-they-call-HQ is.

Very Nice Chrisox08

[unblock]

21. i think it's fair to do this via tax incentives

a company should have a tax incentive to hire people in the states and to spend (expense) in the states.

this could be done via a tax on overseas labor and a tax on shipping/ports.


a company's value to the country is not in how much money it makes, but it how much it spends here, whether on labor or on raw materials.

yeah, yeah, i know, protectionism, yada, yada, yada. it's still the right thing to do. i'd say that the shipping/port tax could be done away with if shipping to a country that plays fair, but i don't really trust politicians to define "fair" very well.

[AsherHeimermann]

11. Comment from Asher Heimermann

Some ideas that we need to think about. I like to see more young people involved in politics and government, like myself. Do you have a blog or website you could share with me? If so, message me with it.

[Chisox08]

14. I haven't started a blog yet

I don't have enough time to do so due to work and school

[Greyhound]

12. In addition, you also forgot to account for the DoD budget.

No nation can sink a trillion dollars a year into a bottomless rat hole of graft and corporate welfare and stay solvent.

[Chisox08]

18. The Department of Defense is not going anywhere

As long as there are Repukes and sheeple that believes everyone is out to kill us the DoD will be the largest liabilty on the American people

[BlooInBloo]

15. Now if only there were the semblance of thought behind any of these wonderful-sounding...

talking points.

[Chisox08]

17. Can you please expand on why do you think that these are

thoughtless "talking points"?
I just want to get a dialog going and get other peoples ideas on what we need to do to get out of this mess that we are in today.

[KingFish019]

20. Maybe not thoughtless talking points, but...

With signs of inflation all around us, your plan involves:

(1) More than doubling the current minimum wage; and,

(2) Instituting two new massive spending programs (universal health care and public works).

Doing both, no less, with an annual budget deficit (thank you, Mr. Bush) that is nearing half a trillion dollars annually.

I think your inflation index would get a lot of work.

[Sanctified]

19. Sounds good but would people be willing to pay for goods or services

to make up the cost of the $15 an hour minimum wage? I personally can barely afford to eat out once a month and it's usually a fast food place, if they increase wages to $15 I am willing to bet the price of their goods is going to increase to match their cost in labor. I can't afford a $6-8 hamburger or $3-5 for fries.

[Chisox08]

25. The only reason the price will go up is because no one is willing to

reign in the insane amount of money most CEOs earn. Its morally wrong that a CEO can make more by noon than most people make all year.

[Hippo_Tron]

28. Raising the minimum wage will probably raise your wages as well

Economic theory also shows that it will raise unemployment but there's no consensus on how much of a correlation there is there. Republicans will obviously spin that to say that if we raise the minimum wage, millions of people will lose their jobs.

Nationally, we could deal with a marginal increase in unemployment considering that some people need to work 2 or 3 jobs to make ends meet and if we raise wages they won't need that 2nd or 3rd job. In some areas (Detroit) an increase in unemployment would be devastating. Economics is largely about trade-offs.

[Sanctified]

32. Wouldn't it require an unlimited supply of money in circulation?

As it is now there is a set amount of money in circulation so you can't increase everyone's wages unless there was an unlimited amount of money available. One could argue that rich CEO's would take lower salaries to pay for the peoples wages however this has never happened nor will it because the rich know that poverty will drop the cost of labor. I am pretty sure that if a $15 an hour minimum wage was ever implemented the only ones who would benefit would be the rich since they could ride out the economic disaster this would cause, if a $15 an hour minimum wage was put into effect within 5 years we would be back to feudalism where the rich would own all the property lost by the poor and middle class who would now be unemployed.

[Hippo_Tron]

33. No, businesses would cut other costs to pay the wages

And while I'm not saying that ALL wages will go up, many will. The reason other wages will go up is that assuming we're near or at full employment, $15 is what you have to pay to get the most uneducated unskilled worker possible. If you want something better, you have to pay more.

And yes part of cutting those costs means cutting jobs. But as I said, unemployment nationally is extremely low and not one of the main problems facing the poor and middle class. The problem is that many of them have to take second and third jobs to make ends meet. So yes some businesses will have to cut their services because they can't afford as much cheap labor.

But to use an anecdotal example, I think we are better off as a society if the video rental store has to close at 10pm instead of 2am on weeknights because they can't afford to pay the minimum wage for a cashier to a guy who already works 9-5 stocking shelves at the grocery store and he doesn't have to take the job because he is paid a decent wage at the grocery store.

Yes I know that it's just an anecdotal example and that some businesses and people would be hurt by an increase. But we're dealing with macroeconomic policy here and we have to evaluate it in terms of macroeconomic effects. And historically, unemployment has not skyrocketed with minimum wage increases.

IMO $15 is a little high for a minimum wage. It should be a living wage which is between $10-$11 an hour depending on where you live, maybe $12 in a super expensive cost of living city like New York. The key is adjusting it for inflation.

[Sanctified]

34. What happens when the business cuts costs by firing skilled labor?

Or replacing skilled labor with unskilled $15 an hour labor. Do you think there is a possibility that the middle class could be totally eradicated since everyone would be making minimum wage while the cost of living increases to reflect the prices of labor.

[Hippo_Tron]

35. Unskilled labor isn't qualified to perform the tasks that skilled labor does

So you're talking about something that is economically impossible. A hospital could in theory fire all of their nurses and hire the janitorial staff to do their jobs but they wouldn't have any patients the next day and would end up paying more in malpractice damages than their insurance covers.

[FatDave]

22. The minimum wage may need to be phased in for reasons outlined above

I'd also suggest removing the cap on social security taxes. Maybe tax penalties for outsourcing employment and tax incentives for hiring within the US?

All good ideas though. Raising the upper income taxes to the levels you suggest is key, and in my mind the most important step.

[Flabbergasted]

24. Right. You'd kill off a lot of small independent businesses who would lose revenue to those who

could eat the additional costs a lot easier. I'm not sure I'd aim at $15/hour either. I'd aim for $10 - $12.

[Chisox08]

26. It seems to me that places with living wage laws are economically sound

compared to the rest of the country. Last time I visited San Francisco a city with a living wage law with an escalation clause prices were just about the same as they are in places where the min. wage is the same as the current federal min. wage.

[Hippo_Tron]

29. Agreed, businesses need time to ladjust

[KamaAina]

23. Over 140 cities and counties now have living wage laws

the highest living wage, in Fairfax, CA (Marin Co.) is $13/hr., while a few others are below the new Federal minimum wage.

http://www.livingwagecampaign.org/index.php?id=1959

edit: for some strange reason, this growing movement, that's been around since the late '80s (Des Moines) hasn't exactly generated a tsunami of publicity in the M$M. :eyes:

[Fire Walk With Me]

30. Republicans want a starving, frightened, cheap labor base

which will not rebel against even the worst conditions and clauses. They've been creating this since Reagan through union-busting and the destruction of the middle class.

They want to be able to be bullies, and have to create the conditions in which others cannot fight back. In other words, they are cowards looking to feel better about themselves through having control of others' lives.

[Hippo_Tron]

31. Raising the income tax to that level is pointless

The uber rich don't make their money in income, they make it in investments which means you need to raise the capital gains rate. Higher capital gains rates will discourage investment. How much of an impact will have is widely debated among economists. Right wingers will tell you that if you raise it even slightly the entire economy will collapse. They are probably wrong.

But at some point the rate will have a significant impact on investment. There are always trade-offs.

When trying to find a good fair and sound tax policy keep one thing in mind: The goal isn't to tax income, sales, property, investment, or inheritance. The goal is to tax wealth. How to best go about that is certainly an interesting question that has yet to be answered.