Mitt Romney hasn't provided details so we should be grateful he's selected as vice president a man with a detailed plan Romney says is "marvelous," "bold and exciting," "excellent," "much needed," and "consistent with" what he's put out.
So let's look at the five basic features of this "marvelous" Ryan plan.
FIRST: It would boost unemployment because it slashes public spending next year and the year after, when the economy is still likely to need a boost, not a fiscal drag. It would be the same austerity trap now throwing Europe into recession. According to the Economic Policy Institute, Ryan's plan would mean 1.3 million fewer jobs next year than otherwise, and 2.8 million fewer the year after.
SECOND: Ryan would take from lower-income Americans and give to the rich -- who already have the biggest share of America's total income and wealth in almost a century. His plan would raise taxes on families earning between 30 and 40 thousand dollars by almost $500 a year, and slash programs like Medicare, food stamps, and children's health What would Ryan do with these savings? Reduce taxes on millionaires by an average of over $500,000 a year.
THIRD: Ryan wants to turn Medicare into vouchers that won't keep up with the rising costs of health care -- thereby shifting the burden onto seniors. By contrast, Obama's Affordable Care Act saves money on Medicare by reducing payments to medical providers like hospitals and drug companies.
FOURTH: He wants to add money to defense while cutting spending on education, infrastructure, and basic research and development. America already spends more on defense than the next five biggest military spenders put together. Our future productivity depends on the public investments Ryan wants to cut.
FIFTH AND Finally, Ryan's budget doesn't even reduce the federal budget deficit -- not for decades. Remember: He's adding to military spending, giving huge additional tax cuts to the very rich, and stifling economic growth by cutting spending too early. The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities estimates Ryan's Roadmap would push public debt to over 175 percent of GDP by 2050.
So there you have it. The Ryan -- Ryan-ROMNEY -- economic plan.
And the five reasons why it would be a disaster for America.
(Please watch the video -- and share.)
ROBERT B. REICH, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written thirteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock" and "The Work of Nations." His latest is an e-book, "Beyond Outrage." He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause.
Follow Robert Reich on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RBReich
Credit.com: Real Confessions of Debt Collectors
 |
 |
|
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Electoral Votes (270 to win) |
332 | 206 |
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Total | 65,899,660 | 60,932,152 |
| Percent | 51.1% | 47.2% |
| Democrats* | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Current Senate | 53 | 47 |
| Seats gained or lost | +2 | -2 |
| New Total | 55 | 45 |
| Democrats | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Seats won | 201 | 234 |
How many of them sound like the Romney/Ryan ticket and the repub plank. Nr 6 seems ot be Romney's specialty today.
I'll take what Riech and Krugman say since so far, they've been pretty accurate and we would be better off if we had listened to them and could have gotten some bills through which would have created jobs.
God forbid that we act like civil adults and work together rather than fight constantly. If you're a Repug and you're upset...deal with it. Your party is mostly responsible for this whole stupid mess.
We have:
Poverty rates at decades highs
42 consecutive months on 8%+ unemployment (after BO bragged that "I can fix the economy").
More added to the national debt in BO's 3.5 years than Bush added in 8 years.
More people on food stamps.
The housing market is still in the crapper.
Gas prices are heading up by leaps and bounds.
Food prices are heading up.
Anyone who thinks that BO has been a success when it comes to the economy is delusional.
Neither Romney nor Obama has announced any plans to get the factories to move back to the US and bring back the jobs so the business community must approve of the current situation.
Obama's and Bush's stimulus stopped the recession taking the economy from losing 800,000 jobs a month to gaining around 200,000 jobs a month.
Remember that the first year of a President is under the budget of the previous president. Clinton left $6 trillion of debt in 2001, Bush left $12 trillion in debt in 2009 plus laws that are adding around $1 trillion a year(2 Wars, MedicareD, tax cut). Under Obama laws were passsed that added around $2 trillion(stimulus, auto bailouts, unemployment insurance). Spending has risen under Obama at the slowest rate since the 1950s and the housing market is recovering with prices rising.
http://articles.marketwatch.com/2012-05-22/commentary/31802270_1_spending-federal-budget-drunken-sailor
Gas is an international market and even the president can't control the weather which affects food prices.
Congress won't pass the President's Bring Jobs Home Act to get jobs brought back to the US and get the economy moving faster so they need to be voted out.
Their plan balances the budget in 2040 and even the Romney Campaign manager didn't know when they would balance the books. We face an crisis of Aggregate Demand, which cutting taxes won't fix.
The 526 economists — including Nobel laureates Gary Becker, Robert Lucas, Robert Mundell, Edward Prescott, and Myron Scholes — point to six facets of Romney’s economic approach that they see as beneficial to future economic success.
Reduce marginal tax rates on business and wage incomes and broaden the tax base to increase investment, jobs, and living standards.End the exploding federal debt by controlling the growth of spending so federal spending does not exceed 20 percent of the economy.Restructure regulation to end “too big to fail,” improve credit availability to entrepreneurs and small businesses, and increase regulatory accountability, and ensure that all regulations pass rigorous benefit-cost tests.Improve our Social Security and Medicare programs by reducing their growth to sustainable levels, ensuring their viability over the long term, and protecting those in or near retirement.Reform our healthcare system to harness market forces and thereby reduce costs and increase quality, empowering patients and doctors, rather than the federal bureaucracy.Promote energy policies that increase domestic production, enlarge the use of all western hemisphere resources, encourage the use of new technologies, end wasteful subsidies, and rely more on market forces and less on government planners.
Seven of the signatories are from Harvard University and five from Columbia University — two of President Barack Obama’s alma maters."
I literally feel a person who has this level of incestuous relationship with their federal government that they relinquish their own self reliance and critical thinking is a cictim of Stockholm syndrome.
Seek help immediately .
Taxes are not the issue, who or how much is paid, this is a smoke screen run by the elections committees.
What America needs is to get back to a system of quality of life. Another words, you work hard, no one putting road blocks in your way and you make a decent living. The term that has become extinct in this country is value added work, you produce a product and sell it for a fair market price.
Paying executives multi-million dollar bonuses to figure out how to squeeze a few more pennies out of a pension fund to relocate overseas while watching millions of people go without health insurance and suffer needless pain is not the America I remember 40-some years ago.
Before their was computers their was mechanization, then computerization, outsourcing to other countries, pensions have been made obsolete by bankruptcies and the shift to 401K self directed (riskier) retirement. All these moves to produce and make efficiencies is great but the profit went to the Bane Capitals (of the world) and CEO's. The trickle down the leg somehow dried up like the once thunderous Colorado River heading to Mexico.
Obama did not bother to reform the tax code when he could have in 2009 2010. So the rich still have loopholes and the poor dont pay a penny.
So Mr Reich, who pays the 1.5 trillion? The penalties, the max 600 bucks some will contribute do little to reduce this number.
What the democrats will not tell you is that the MIDDLE CLASS PAYS FOR THE ENTIRE OBAMACARE BILL
Thank Obama for destroying the middle class.
The dirty little secret that we already have 'socialized' medicine, and it has only made it more expensive. The dirty little secret that so many are refusing to address is that when medical services are financed primarily through the government taxation and money-printing, the only way costs are controlled is by rationing medical services.That is, what medical goods and services you are allowed to receive is determined by government bureaucrats. Basic services may be 'free', but access to anything else will be determined by your political influence, or your ability to bribe, or your ability to circumvent the system by seeking services elsewhere.
Honestly get a clue!
The question is: Why is the Romney-Ryan ticket finding support for it?
My guess is a significant number of voters believe the government should play a smaller role in the national culture.
Many of said significant number of voters routinely support candidates who run for political office on the premise that government doesn't work and if elected do everything in their power to sabotage our government so as to prove their point.
Resentment for being made to pay for the privilege of doing business with the people runs deep.
Why do we have to pay for the privilege of doing business with the people?
Because quality people need to be nurtured.
Quality people need to be educated, fed, clothed, housed, entertained, protected from abuse when they work, cared for when their sick , and cared for when their old.
My guess is many of said significant number of voters believe organized religion should play a larger role in the national culture and charities run by organized religion should be caring for the young, the poor, the sick and the old.
If so, then pointing out that the Romney-Ryan economic plan would a disaster for America will have little or no effect on the beliefs of many of said significant number of voters.
A more effective approach might be to challenge the idea that organized religion should play a larger role in our national culture.
Thanks for the update Rob . . .
We can't even get Congress to pass a year plan . . . definitely not a 5 year or 10 year plan . . . yet you're going with the 50 year plan.