Liberalgeek’s Plan For Fiscal Stimulation
Dear President Obama (I’m sick of this President-elect crap),
We need to spend some money. We need that money spent in every nook and cranny of these United States. Trying to mobilize enough projects to make a difference in the short to medium term will be very difficult from a centralized standpoint. We need to budget more than a half a trillion dollars to be spent on making this country stronger, and more competitive in the world.
Each Governor (in conjunction with their Congressional delegation) will be challenged to find projects in their states that will have maximum impact in the next 18 months. The projects would all have to fall within a few categories like energy efficiency, renewable energy infrastructure, roads and bridges, mass transit expansion and modernization of schools.
Each state would be awarded up to $1 billion per Senator or Congressman (Delaware gets $3 Billion, California gets $55B). Successful states would be eligible for additional grants in 18-24 months.
I know that Steve Newton’s head just exploded and Hube is only able to shout curse words in Spanish, but we need to get this country working. As far as I can tell, we gave (or will have given) a trillion dollars to a few institutions that seem to have squandered that cash and hope that we are satisfied that “things aren’t worse.” And at the end of my program, we will be less dependent on foreign oil, we will pollute our environment less and we will modernize our infrastructure and economy.
Liberalgeek
Brilliant in its simplicity!
The beach at Bethany will be wide enough to land a 747 on.
Seriously though… you make a good point, but I still can’t give up the idea of Federal direction for certain common-sense investments. I would hate to have to come back next year to do some of these things, only to find there is no money left because the states blew it all. Off the top of my head…
For example, directing some of the road money to revive freight rail instead. We don’t need all our goods shipped over fragile roads in diesel-guzzling, particle-emitting trucks.
Or carefully chosen high-speed passenger rail, to develop new bedroom communities in places that were previously unreachable.
Housing money, with restrictions to favor redevelopment of existing structures (i.e., slums or brownfields).
Or water projects, to sustain new developments and protect farm capacity.
And money targeted for hiring teachers, with iron clad restrictions to make sure class size is actually reduced.
Money for caregivers… we need qualified staff for nursing homes and group homes, and it needs to be a job that has dignity.
one more point… we need to reform government purchasing rules to limit the lobbyists, pay to play schemes, and no bid contracts.
Otherwise this new spending will plant the seeds of the corruption that will bring the Democrats down.
My light rail commute has gone from wild eyed dream to mere improbably fantasy.
Not heard much about high speed rail along the east coast (the most heavily trafficked ) in terms of infrastructure investments . Granted this is a long term project but we can’t let Yurp beat us in high speed rail.
Also the roads, bridges need to be fixed but it is time to provide a decent alternative to flying/driving between Boston and Northern Virginia.
I was thinking of bullet trains to coastal cities from interior regions, in the 40-minute commute range at 150+ mph.
Good Idea Geek
Here’s one I would like to see happen the government should give 100% grant to folks who wish to put solar panels on their homes to make them green. the excess electricity that’s placed on the grid would have to be bought by the Utility Companies, However, my plan would revert this payment back to the government and give each taxpayer a tax credit for their surplus electric. Not only would the Home owner benefit by lowering his electric bill but also give those who conserve a greater tax credit over those who consume more.
one other Idea while we are on the subject the United states navy has many nuclear ships and subs in moth balls i say lite them up and put them on the grid a clean source of power
The naval nukes aren’t designed for that; if you want nukes it would be cheaper and safer to build one of the newer ground based plants.
Anon
They are power plants so you are wrong in fact a Naval Aircraft carrier was use in a big city in the northwestern part of the US to supply a city with electric power for over a month. In fact it was the only power source
Where is the money for R&D? That needs to be done as well. I think there are things that need to be done with some federal direction, so that we don’t get 50 different railways, for example.
For energy efficiency, I suggest:
– Change all state vehicle to electric, or plug in hybrids
– Retrofit buses to be hybrids
– Tax credits for solar panel installation
– Set green energy targets for state goverments, very aggressive ones
Anon
Not to beat a subject to death but in 2006 a study was conducted at M.I.T. by Dr Derek Scott who listed the out put of various naval ships both nuke and steam. the range was from subs to carriers and all in between. His findings revealed that the ship to shore output ranged from 1500 homes to over 110000 homes the efficiency increased sufficiently if more ships were connected in parallel.So as you can see placing these ships in a position so that their out put could be placed on the grid could add to the decrease of coal fire units. Any little bit helps.
I think there are things that need to be done with some federal direction, so that we don’t get 50 different railways
The “regional authority” model is a good one for financing and managing infrastructure. It works.
Won’t work. I like that each state should get infrastructure aid, but your plan is too big to implement in a year and too political in the allocation of the money. A 300 billion dollar corporatate rate tax cut and business investment tax credit would do a lot more. Then implement the Obama middle class and working poor tax relief.
Cut it back to 100 million per member of Congress additional aid for each of two years. Take another 150 billion and upgrade our energy infrastructure. Put up the mini Nuke plants instead of wasting money with clean coal, redesign and upgrade our power transportation so we can build wind farms where there is wind and transport the power to the populations. Support sugar ethanol and invest in trash to fuel.
We should use this time to upgrade our infrastructure like we did in the 1950’s for a modern society. Now we should do so again. Don’t just build more roads. The economy will recover, let’s look at long term growth as well.
Corporations are already paying little tax.
As far as business investment credits – we have already experimented with flooding businesses with money – it doesn’t work; they just pay it out to their executives and investors and don’t reinvest.
A modest increase in capital gains tax would take the focus off of short term gains in share price.
And returning to the former practice of taxing dividends as regular income would go a long way to encouraging business reinvestment.
If we flood the consumer with money, businesses can take care of themselves.
Well, sir, there’s nothing on earth like a genuine, bona fide, electrified, six-car monorail!
Check out this long, but fascinating article on electric cars. http://www.wired.com/cars/futuretransport/magazine/16-09/ff_agassi?currentPage=all
A modest increase in capital gains tax would take the focus off of short term gains in share price.
And returning to the former practice of taxing dividends as regular income would go a long way to encouraging business reinvestment.
That gets us part of the way home. We also need to tax executive bonuses at around 55%. Right now bonuses (esp. bonus related to stock price targets) drain an ungodly amount of money away from retained earnings and reinvestment.
Nonsense, we should just round up all the executives . . . oh wait that’s another post.
a monorail from Wilmington to the beach a switch at Dover for Seaford and points south
Flooding the working man with cash would pull us out of this mess ,however, the repuks want us all to make what they make in china and that’s $7.00 a week or less in some places. So who would by the SUV’S there are not enough CEO’S to keep the assembling line working
How about a bullet train from Wilmington to Washington so Biden can keep commuting?
Obama and Joe will be taking the metro to DC and Obama will have to stop in Wilmington to pick up Joe . I will be out of town when this happens to bad would love to be at Penn Station.
You’re right TT, we need to actually manufacture things in the U.S. instead of relying on China to do it for us.
UI finally struck on something.. manufacturing.
If you want to rebuild this economy, start with producing something. This country has high efficiency production due to technology, and nothing to produce.
Mr Geek wrote:
Well, then use the proper salutation: former Senator Obama, because he isn’t the president-elect yet!
The Constitution specifies that the presidential electors meet on the same day in their respective state capitols, to cast their ballots. Those results are then sealed and transmitted to the Congress. At the opening of the new Congress, the President of the Senate — in thios case, Vice President Richard Cheney — will open the ballots before a joing session of Congress and announce the results. If a candidate has a majority of all electoral votes possible for president, Mr Cheney will announce to that joint session of Congress that that candidate has been elected to be the next President of the United States. It is only at that point that Barack Hussein Obama — or anyone else — will become the president-elect.
As of right now, the President of the United States is George Walker Bush! 🙂
anon wrote:
No, corporations are already paying no tax! Corporations simply collect taxes from the eventual end consumers of their products, who are you and me, in the prices that they charge for their products. The entire tax burden falls on the individual, but our politicians, both Democratic and Republican, use the phantasm of “corporate taxes” to hide that fact from the American taxpayer.
Truth Teller told part of the truth:
Flooding the individual with cash would have them spending that money in the economy; since most of our manufactured goods come from abroad these days, much of that cash would be sent to China.
Mrs Isotope continued with:
Things are manufactured abroad because the American consumer has chosen to buy products manufactured abroad! They are cheaper, and of equal or better quality.
No, corporations are already paying no tax! Corporations simply collect taxes from the eventual end consumers of their products, who are you and me, in the prices that they charge for their products. The entire tax burden falls on the individual, but our politicians, both Democratic and Republican, use the phantasm of “corporate taxes” to hide that fact from the American taxpayer.
Such idiocy.
Hey Dana – Move to Hati. It is a tax paradise.