Expose Obama » Economic stimulus

1.9 Million Fewer Americans Working Now Than When Obama Signed Stimulus Bill

Ben — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 02:25:57 +0000

Matt Cover, CNSNews.com

Twenty-eight months after Congress passed President Obama’s signature economic stimulus law, and nearly one year after he declared the summer of 2010 to be “Recovery Summer,” 1.9 million fewer people are employed.

In February 2009, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that 141.7 million people were employed. By the end of May 2011 – the last month for which data are available – that number had fallen to 139.8 million, a difference of 1.9 million.

While the number of people with jobs has increased slightly from its low point during the recession – 137.9 million in December 2009 – those 1.9 million jobs have been lost despite $800 billion in stimulus spending.

This does not mean that the economy is not creating jobs, but rather that it is not creating jobs fast enough to keep up with a combination of layoffs and people entering the job market for the first time.

In a Washington Post op-ed, former White House chief economist Larry Summers noted that the percentage of the population that has a job has not improved, even though the economy is technically in recovery.

Tax the Rich — Until There Aren’t Any Left

Ben — Fri, 18 Mar 2011 14:24:08 +0000

Don Feder, GrassTopsUSA.com

They say you get less of what you tax and more of what you subsidize. The left feels there are still too many producers in this country. But it has a solution – tax them into extinction.

Increasingly, the Democrats and their stooges sound like villains from an Ayn Rand novel – Wesley Mooch or Lee Hunsacker.

Posturing at a Democratic rally in Sarasota, Florida, last week, horror-writer Stephen King announced, “As a rich person (not to mention a monument to the public’s abysmal taste in “literature”) I pay (a) 28 percent tax. What I want to ask you is why am I not paying 50? Why isn’t anyone in my bracket paying 50 (percent)?”

Perhaps that’s because Cujo-boy isn’t paying a 28 percent federal tax.

King has an estimated net worth of $300 million. As the author of 49 novels, which have sold over 350 million copies, royalties alone would put him in the top tax bracket of 35 percent, which starts at $373,650. But since his taxes are probably handled by a phalanx of accountants and lawyers, perhaps he can be forgiven for thinking that he and the rest of the “super-rich” pay a top-rate of 28 percent.

King, who has a B.A. in English from the University of Maine, sounds like an MBA-graduate of the Wharton School of Finance next to college-dropout and Castro-symp Michael Moore.

“This is class war,” Moore raved on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Show last Wednesday, reacting to what appears to be the end of the line for the Wisconsin public-employee gravy train – which the socialist fat-cat naturally blames on “the rich.”

With a tenuous hold on reality at the best of times, Moore has become totally unhinged: “I’d like anybody who works on Wall Street, anybody who works for the banks, just take a look at (the lawlessness in Madison). This is what’s coming for you. Because the people are going to demand justice, they’re going to demand that your ass is in jail.”

The clincher came when the bloated Bolshevik announced to the malefactors of wealth….

The Top 10 Obama Administration Investigation Targets

Ben — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 14:12:25 +0000

Human Events

Rep. Darrell Issa (R.-Calif.), the new chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has signaled he will conduct numerous oversight investigations of the Obama Administration. Here are the Top 10 areas ripe for investigation for Issa and other congressional Republicans:

(1) ObamaCare: Any measure that restructures one-sixth of the U.S. economy bears scrutiny particularly when passage of the bill required legislative bribes such as the Louisiana Purchase and Cornhusker Kickback. To paraphrase Nancy Pelosi, now that ObamaCare has passed, let’s see exactly what is in it — and how it got there.

(2) Stimulus: The American people deserve to know what they got for the $787 billion stimulus package that Obama signed in February 2009, including how much money was spent frivolously to publicize the legislation. And where exactly are all those jobs that the administration claims were “created or saved?”

(3) Freddie and Fannie: Previous attempts by congressional Democrats to get to the bottom of the 2008 financial meltdown conveniently overlooked the role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. How much of the housing crisis was due to financial donations going to Democratic officials, who overlooked financial transgressions at the agencies so long as mortgages flowed to unworthy credit risks?

(4) Wikileaks: Someone in the administration needs to explain how the lowly serviceman who served up secret documents to Wikileaks could have access to such a large amount of classified material. And were any actions taken to shut down Julian Assange in the months after the initial disclosures and before the embarrassing leak of State Department cables?

Lame Duck Produces a Lame Economy

Ben — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 21:58:00 +0000

Floyd and Mary Beth Brow, FloydReports.com

The lame duck Congress and President Obama are retarding the recovery. It’s tough medicine to swallow-- ending unemployment benefits for people who have been out of work for three years-- but it is necessary if we want recovery.

The official U.S. unemployment rate has not been beneath 9 percent since April 2009, and it is unlikely to dip until much of the currently unemployed take jobs paying lower wages and benefits. Back in 2000, 7.2 percent of blue collar workers were either unemployed or underemployed. Today that figure is a staggering 19.5 percent.

When 2007 began, more than 1 million Americans were unemployed for half a year or longer. Today, there are more than 6 million Americans unemployed for half a year or longer. Since 2000, we have lost 10 percent of our living wage jobs. In the year 2000 there were approximately 72 million living wage jobs in the United States, but today, there are only about 65 million jobs capable of supporting a middle class lifestyle.

When comparing 1940 with 2010, the United States now employs about the same number of people in manufacturing. Considering the fact that we had 132 million people living in this country in 1940, and well over 300 million people living in this country today, this is a sobering statistic.

The real culprits in the unemployment problem are 1) overregulation-- which retards growth, 2) high taxes -- which encourage multinationals to move factories abroad, and 3) illegal immigration-- which depresses entry level job wages.

We agree that now is a bad time to increase taxes, but to keep taxes at the current level, the Republicans accepted Obama's failed stimulus policies that will continue to retard economic growth. Republican leaders should have waited until January and sent Obama a bill without the Christmas tree of failed stimulus programs attached.

Currently the U.S. economy is dealing with too much debt and too much spending.

We are like a family overextended on the credit cards, but we are refusing to cut spending. This situation can end one of two ways. The family can adjust the lifestyle, cut up the credit cards, and pay down debt over time, or the family can be forced to adjust their lifestyle after the banks freeze the credit cards, the home is foreclosed, and the car is towed away.

We prefer the first scenario for the United States. But we are ashamed to admit the politicians, including Republicans, are likely to aggravate the problems until we face disaster.

The lame duck Congress and President Obama are retarding the recovery. It’s tough medicine to medicine to swallow — ending unemployment benefits for people who have been out of work for three years — but it is necessary if we want recovery.

The real culprits in the unemployment problem are 1) overregulation– which retards growth, 2) high taxes — which encourage multinationals to move factories abroad, and 3) illegal immigration– which depresses entry level job wages.

We agree that now is….

Biden Says Stimulus Fraud at "Surprisingly Low Level"

Ben — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 22:09:59 +0000

Judicial Watch

In yet another delusional assessment of the administration’s disastrous stimulus program Vice President Joe Biden claims that fraud and abuse has been kept “to a surprisingly low level” thanks to rigorous oversight.

The laughable estimate comes just a few months after Biden made a fool of himself touting a scandal-plagued welfare program to make low-income houses energy efficient as an example of success in stimulus spending…

Biden conveniently omitted reality (9.6% unemployment rate) by failing to mention that tens of billions of dollars have gone to wasteful projects, including international ant research, studying why monkeys react negatively to inequity, a “tunnel to nowhere” in Pennsylvania and a $3 million turtle crossing in Florida, to name a few. At least $20 million has been spent on road signs declaring that the stimulus is “putting Americans back to work” and tens of millions more on a number of other frivolous projects that have been documented in several different reports.

Congressman Issa: Congress Must Oversee Executive Branch

Ben — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 18:02:59 +0000

Congressman Darrell Issa, Floyd Reports

The unparalleled encroachment of the federal government in the private sector and the lives of individual Americans that began during the Bush Administration and continues in the Obama Administration (see, for example, the Troubled Assets Protection Program, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the rapid growth of the federal workforce, and the health care and financial overhauls) has led to concerns of an oncoming tsunami of opacity, waste, fraud, and abuse. This trend must be met by vigorous Congressional oversight of the massive federal bureaucracy.

The vast expansion of the power and reach of the executive branch of government under both Republican and Democratic administrations has only increased the need for vigorous, unflinching congressional oversight. Under one-party rule in Washington, with Democrats controlling both chambers of Congress and the executive branch, the majority reiterated its commitment to congressional oversight.

Unfortunately, since President Obama took office 19 months ago, the country has seen the emergence of a large accountability gap. Congress’ chief watchdog committee has failed repeatedly to conduct meaningful and sustained investigations and hold federal executives and bureaucrats responsible for the unprecedented levels of waste, fraud, and abuse that such rapid growth has nurtured.

Despite repeated requests by the Republican minority for oversight hearings, joint investigations, and subpoenas, and despite myriad news reports raising allegations of waste, fraud, and other misconduct, the Oversight Committee and the Democratic-controlled Congress have overwhelmingly shunned responsible but tough oversight of the Obama administration.

As of August 2010, the Republican members of the Oversight Committee had sent 46 letters to the Democratic Chairman of the committee or its subcommittee chairs requesting hearings, additional witnesses at hearings, or subpoenas of important documents related to significant investigations. Formal responses were received for only six of those requests.

Cash for Clunkers Hurt the Poor – and Obama's Advisers Love It

Ben — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 22:07:03 +0000

Ben Johnson, Floyd Reports

The Democrats’ “Cash for Clunkers” program had one major impact on the market: it raised prices almost $2,000 per car in a way that disproportionately hurts the poor. And Obama’s Green Left advisers could not be happier.

The automobile industry authority Edmunds.com has found used car prices are up 10.3 percent over last summer. The average used vehicle costs $1,800 more than it did one year ago. The price hike is even greater for larger vehicles. Warner Todd Huston of Gateway Pundit has the details. (Also h/t to Mass SNAFU.)

The program (which most Americans opposed) cost $3 billion. In the end, taxpayers shelled out $24,000 per car sale generated. A study conducted at the University of California-Davis found even the environmental benefit cost us “at least 10 times the ‘sticker price‘ to reduce emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.” As usual, the Obama administration could put up with zero dissent. When the automobile industry authority Edmunds.com pointed out the program’s failure, the White House website carried a savage denunciation, and a Transportation Department official sniped at Edmunds by name. (His claims were later debunked.)

Now we see just how helpful it was: the average citizen paid $24,000 in taxes per unique sale for the privilege of paying $1,800 more per car this summer. Joe Spina of Edmunds.com explained how this happened:

It’s believed that the program delayed purchases prior to the program and also pulled sales forward while in place. The program also eliminated inventory of older vehicles that were traded and then scrapped.

In other words, as soon as Obama announced the Cash for Clunkers program, everyone considering buying a used vehicle waited until the rebate kicked in. Those on the fence hurried to buy a car before the money ran out, causing a short-term boom. And since the program required all the “gas-guzzling” trade-ins to be scrapped, there are fewer used cars available this summer, driving up prices. (After all, the point of the program was not just to provide an economic stimulus but to destroy automobiles with lower fuel standards that emitted more greenhouse gases.) With “Recovery Summer” turning into Recession 2.0, fewer people want to purchase new vehicles and are getting less expensive, used models.

So, greater demand plus lower supply equals higher prices.

Since wealthier Americans, who would ordinarily buy a new car, are now purchasing “pre-owned” vehicles, they can outbid poorer Americans. The people really hurt by this are the poor and lower middle class, who needed to buy a new-to-them minivan or SUV to take the kids to practice. They have been priced out of the market and have to stick with their decrepit vehicles. (That puts a new twist on the phrase, “Cash for Clunkers,” doesn’t it?)

Rest assured, run-of-the-mill liberals will look at the damage their policies have created and suggest it can be fixed by an even bigger “stimulus.” But Obama’s Green Left advisers have a different reaction.

Higher prices were not an unintended consequence for them. They are ideologically committed to reducing America’s carbon footprint, ideally by herding more poor people into public transportation. Pricing the poor out of the market for used cars is one step in that direction.

Obama’s Science Czar John Holdren has dedicated his life to imagining a future radically different from the one envisioned by our Founding Fathers. He wrote a 2006 paper that analyzed reducing “GDP per person” — that is, cutting your personal wealth — in order to reduce greenhouse gases. While he said this is “not a lever that most people would want to use to reduce emissions,” it a possibility. After all, “People are not getting rich as fast as they think” if their happiness comes “at the expense of the environmental underpinnings of well-being.” In 1997, Holdren said raising the price of natural gas was “actually a good idea.” His close friend Dr. James Hansen, whom Holdren called “one of the most distinguished climate scientists in the world,” suggested to Obama in late 2008 that he should tax gasoline up to “$4/5 gallons again.”

Higher prices for cars and gasoline — and the misery they inflict on the poor and middle class — fulfill their purposes.

Unfortunately, the higher cost of used cars is the least important price we are paying for putting Barack Obama into power.

Why Obamanomics Has Failed

NewsEditor — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 15:51:13 +0000

By ALLAN H. MELTZER, The Wall Street Journal

The administration’s stimulus program has failed. Growth is slow and unemployment remains high. The president, his friends and advisers talk endlessly about the circumstances they inherited as a way of avoiding responsibility for the 18 months for which they are responsible.

But they want new stimulus measures—which is convincing evidence that they too recognize that the earlier measures failed. And so the U.S. was odd-man out at the G-20 meeting over the weekend, continuing to call for more government spending in the face of European resistance.

The contrast with President Reagan’s antirecession and pro-growth measures in 1981 is striking. Reagan reduced marginal and corporate tax rates and slowed the growth of nondefense spending. Recovery began about a year later. After 18 months, the economy grew more than 9% and it continued to expand above trend rates.

Two overarching reasons explain the failure of Obamanomics. First, administration economists and their outside supporters neglected the longer-term costs and consequences of their actions. Second, the administration and Congress have through their deeds and words heightened uncertainty about the economic future. High uncertainty is the enemy of investment and growth.

Most of the earlier spending was a very short-term response to long-term problems. One piece financed temporary tax cuts. This was a mistake, and ignores the role of expectations in the economy. Economic theory predicts that temporary tax cuts have little effect on spending. Unless tax cuts are expected to last, consumers save the proceeds and pay down debt. Experience with past temporary tax reductions, as in the Carter and first Bush presidencies, confirms this outcome.

Economists: The stimulus didn’t help

NewsEditor — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 11:28:00 +0000

CNN Money

Economists say stimulus had “little or no effect”

The recovery is picking up steam as employers boost payrolls, but economists think the government’s stimulus package and jobs bill had little to do with the rebound, according to a survey released Monday.

In latest quarterly survey by the National Association for Business Economics, the index that measures employment showed job growth for the first time in two years — but a majority of respondents felt the fiscal stimulus had no impact.

NABE conducted the study by polling 68 of its members who work in economic roles at private-sector firms. About 73% of those surveyed said employment at their company is neither higher nor lower as a result of the $787 billion Recovery Act, which the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers says is on track to create or save 3.5 million jobs by the end of the year.

How Is the Stimulus Money Allocated?

NewsEditor — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 11:11:00 +0000

By Veronique de Rugy, National Review

Obama is using the Stimulus for political purposes

Unemployment isn’t a factor, but politics is. Your stimulus dollars at work.

Using recipient report data from Recovery.gov, as well as economic and political data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, GovTrack.us, and others, I have compiled a series of facts about stimulus spending. The complete dataset used for this report is available for download at Mercatus.org — it covers the fourth quarter of the calendar-year 2009 Recovery Act contracts and grants only — but here are the main facts.

First: The idea behind the $787 billion stimulus bill is that, if the government spends money where it is the most needed, it will create jobs and trigger economic growth. Hence, we should expect the government to invest more money in districts with higher unemployment rates.

Controlling for the percentage of the district employed in the construction industry, a proxy for the vulnerability to recession of a district, I find no statistical correlation for all relevant unemployment indicators and the allocation of funds. This suggests that unemployment is not the factor leading the awards. Also, I found no correlation between other economic indicators, such as income, and stimulus funding.

Second: On average, Democratic districts received one-and-a-half times as many awards as Republican ones. Democratic districts also received two-and-a-half times more stimulus dollars than Republican districts ($122,127,186,509 vs. $46,139,592,268). Republican districts also received smaller awards on average. (The average dollars awarded per Republican district is $260,675,663, while the average dollars awarded per Democratic district is $471,533,539.)