The more and more I read and listen about the proposed stimulus bill currently being torn apart in the Senate, the more I think that the bill is suffering from an identity crisis. A stimulus bill is a bill that injects capital into the market, while a job creation bill is design to establish projects to put people to work. With 4 million jobs in mind, Obama is pushing for a job creation bill. The Republicans are pushing for tax cuts and rebates, so they are hoping for a stimulus bill. Most Democrats share a view with Obama, but some others are simply looking for a political reward bill (sorry, but it is true). So what should the Senate work towards?
In my view, the whole thing should be scrapped. We are being told every day that this bill must be passed and quickly. The President will even be having a prime time press conference on Monday to by-pass the media in an attempt to convince a general public that doesn’t support the bill. While I can’t speak for the 65% of the population that isn’t supporting the bill, I think that the economy isn’t as bad as is being hyped.
Over a trillion dollars has already been set aside to cover the financial and insurance companies as well as the automotive industry. While this money primarily covers existing debt, that is a trillion new dollars pumped into our economy. Do we need another trillion in less than a year? And if so, doesn’t that indicate “money” isn’t the problem but rather something else?
My first recommendation is the hundreds of FEMA trailers that are still occupied around the Gulf Coast. “What do FEMA trailers have to do with the economy” you might ask. Part of the problem with our economy stems from a housing market that has collapsed over the past year. This collapse has led to many homes falling into foreclosure or being abandoned. While houses remain empty along the Gulf Coast, the government is spending millions of dollars on providing, maintaining, and paying rent for FEMA trailers to house displaced residents following Katrina, Rita, and Gustav. If the government would transfer the mortgages from destroyed homes belonging to these displaced residents to a foreclosed home, you will decrease the supply of homes on the market, increasing demand. Additionally, the government can sell of the remaining trailers, cancel their rent obligations, and end housing individuals unnecessarily. Will this solve our economic problem? No, but it is a start that doesn’t cost the government money for years to come.
My second recommendation would be one I made before. President Bush’s hydrogen economy project is still operating in the background behind the debates over oil drilling and wind technology. If the nation is serious about ending the dependency on foreign oil, cleaning up the environment, creating millions of jobs, and decreasing our trade deficit, then hydrogen should be one of our largest projects to focus on. Money is already allocated towards this project and work has begun, so the start-up phase of job creation has already started. This would create additional high-tech jobs (research and development), industrial jobs (construction of fuel cells, infrastructure, automobiles), service jobs (sales, tech support), and so on. Not only would this improve our economic and national security, we would also become the exporters of the technology around the world. Currently, Germany and Japan are leading the United States in hydrogen fuel cell development.
These two simple suggestions are just examples of the approach the nations’ leadership should take towards not only turning our economy around, but also build a long-term foundation for future economic growth much like the technology boom of the 1980s and 1990s. It is time to put aside the political glad-handing and pork project payback that is currently going on in the House and Senate, as well as the fear rhetoric coming from the White House, and start taking a logical approach towards changing the direction of our economy. It is common sense after all.
Related articles:
MLoger – “Making Work not Creating Jobs”
The Fireside Post – “Lincoln and Obama, Saving the Union”
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