Obama plans to spend a lot of money but claims he won't need to raise taxes to do so. I wonder where and how the money is to be spent. If I had known that FEMA was going to give several thousand dollars to each resident of New Orleans after Katrina, I would've quickly opened a store and sold spinning rims and curb feelers. Regardless of your political affiliation (if any) how would you spend the money to kick start the economy? If the money isn't changing hands it won't help. How can we spend it to ensure that it keeps moving?
The "rich." Before too long, Monolopy money will be worth more than our dollar. We're spending and giving away more than what we have.
One industry...housing. Unless housing is moving, and its not, the economy will be in shambles. Spend whats left on housing related stimulus and it will have the desired results.
You do realize we're dangerously close or might already be in a deflationary period right? I don't disagree that we run the risk of a quick about face with huge inflation but I can tell you, it's much better than the alternative which is stag deflation.
We can't just pump money into housing, people need steady jobs to be able to pay for housing on their own.
I hear "infrastructure projects", fix bridges so they don't collapse and kill people, build a power grid that is modern so we can move electric power from where it is generated to where its needed (as in, for wind generated elec. that T. Boone talks about), and building new schools. This helps by providing jobs, and we actually need those things. Water and sewer infrastructure is badly needed in many major cities. Could be an airport or two get built.
Housing? What are you going to do? Buy houses for people? That won't help. Infrastructure - road building. Those infrastructure jobs can last two or more years.
Housing AND its ancillary businesses combined are at the top of private sector employment. Selling is only a small part of a big puzzle. Its about the related fields, think about it. Housing is a major back bone of our economy and its failure began our downward spiral.
Public works I hope. The interstate highway system is falling apart and we have thousands of bridges and levees that need replacement. Blighted inner city properties need to be demolished and rebuilt. Millions of construction jobs can be created to do this and a lot of work for all the support businesses too. Hiring illegal aliens to do any of the work should be outlawed right up front.
Infrastructure deterioration has been shelved for too long. Problem is - other than a few specific media-friendly projects, it's going to take a long, long time to do the serious work - won't satisfy the spin-doctors and their addicts. Personally, I think inner city properties should be left to private means. A new house/building isn't going to change the behavior that leads to those areas deteriorating in the first place. Waste of money. Agree on the illegals. Trouble is - and I'll take shots for this but it's absolutely true - there is a shortage of low income workers who are willing/able to do dangerous manual labor. And those that ARE willing/able will be wanting inflated union wages. Legal aliens will be required to do a GREAT deal of this work. There is a disturbing trend in the young "blue collar" workforce that the military is aware of but I don't think the rest of the country quite gets yet. Namely, the quantity and quality of the "qualified" work force. Drugs and alchohol, education and lifestyle (read police records) are significantly impacting the number of blue-collar workers who you would consider grooming for low to middle level construction management responsibilities. Part of the country's problem stems from greed. An equal and equally troubling part stems from ignorance and laziness. FWIW.
