Keep taxes low and government involvement at a minimum so the free market can work
Focus on creating good jobs at home and securing a safety net for all Americans
Get the U.S. back on track to compete in the global economy
It’s private industry -- not the government -- that is the engine of economic growth and job creation, so the best thing the government can do is step back and give businesses the room they need to grow and compete in the global market. That means low taxes, minimal regulation and international free trade. When businesses thrive, they hire more people. When jobs are plentiful, wages go up and more and more Americans benefit from a growing standard of living. When America’s entrepreneurs, business people and investors have the freedom they need to create new, growing enterprises, our economy is the wonder of the world. Recessions do come along from time to time, and not all American businesses can or should be protected in the global marketplace. There may be some temporary job losses, but in the long run, the country gains far more than it loses. Our history shows that.
It’s time to redefine what we mean by a healthy economy. It’s not just economic growth and big profits for private industry. It’s when average people who work hard every day have secure, comfortable lives. The way things are now, the rich are benefitting most from economic growth; the people who run machines, provide services, clean offices and keep the economy going day to day can barely make ends meet. Even worse, average Americans are constantly at risk of losing ground -- of losing their jobs and pensions, and of being financially ruined if they have a major illness. It’s time to stop buying the argument that whatever’s good for business is good for the rest of us, because it’s not working. We won’t have a good economy until we have enough good jobs and a strong enough safety net that all Americans can earn a decent living.
We can’t stop the world from changing, so we need to get our act together to be the farsighted, competitive, sensible country that the United States used to be. That means getting our financial house in order by balancing the federal budget and becoming a nation of savers, not spenders. This means investing in research, technology, energy and education so the U.S. can compete effectively. Last and not least, it means educating our kids in math, science, technology and foreign languages and making sure they have effective schools and teachers. The government is over $9 trillion in debt, and as a country we spend more than we save. Our roads, bridges, utilities and communications are falling behind those of other nations. Our kids don’t do as well as those of many competing countries on math and science exams. Meanwhile, major U.S. businesses are predicting shortages of engineers and scientists unless we get our educational system up to par.
Keep taxes low and government involvement at a minimum so the free market can work
Focus on creating good jobs at home and securing a safety net for all Americans
Get the U.S. back on track to compete in the global economy
What should be done?
Cut taxes on income and investments so entrepreneurs and investors have an incentive to take risks with new ideas and approaches.
Cut taxes on businesses. We want them to use their money for research and development so they can compete in the global market – not to fund a bloated federal government.
Drastically reduce regulations that hamstring businesses and raise costs. This makes American businesses less competitive globally.
Seek out and expand free trade agreements.
Aggressively pursue the rights of American companies to enter markets worldwide.
Create a universal health insurance system so that all Americans are covered regardless of whether they work full-time or part-time, as engineers or waiters, for a socially-responsible employer or not..
Raise taxes on upper-income Americans and inheritances worth over $3 million and use the money to cover universal health insurance.
Raise the minimum wage to help those at the low end of the income scale. Expand unemployment benefits to help workers through bad periods.
Revamp the tax system to discourage businesses from moving jobs overseas and encourage them to offer better employee benefits.
Refuse to sign free trade agreements with countries that cut costs by unfair labor practices and poor environmental policies.
Bolster unions to raise the wages of ordinary workers.
Balance the federal budget by going back to the tax rates we had in the 1990s and by cutting wasteful spending.
Close tax loopholes for big businesses and tax inheritances over $3 million. Use the money to improve roads, bridges, communications and education systems.
Revamp the tax code to reward saving and discourage borrowing.
Clamp down on predatory lending and aggressive marketing of credit cards, mortgages and loans.
Provide more scholarships for students who pursue math, science and engineering and other technology subjects. Provide bonuses for math and science teachers to keep the best ones in the classroom.
Establish a national math and science curriculum to ensure that our students are learning what they need to know in the vital areas.
Arguments For This Approach
The economy does best when government gets out of the way. The free market consistently provides a higher standard of living than any other method.
We have much lower unemployment and better growth than foreign economies in which the government plays a broader role. Let’s not kill the goose that’s laying the golden egg.
Free trade directly benefits American consumers with lower prices and a wider choice of products.
Free trade may mean some jobs move to other countries, but new jobs and new industries will be created at home.
There’s a genuine human cost to an unrestrained free market system. Too many corporations eliminate jobs and benefits to ramp up profits. They’re doing well enough. The rest of us are not.
Other industrial nations have shown that it’s possible to maintain a successful capitalist system while making sure their citizens have health care and job protections.
Blindly following free trade helped move blue-collar manufacturing jobs overseas, and now white-collar jobs are following them. We should only sign trade agreements that are good for the country as a whole. The minimum wage has lagged behind inflation, and hard-working people cannot survive on wages this low.
National health insurance might cost more in taxes, but it would take a major burden off business and make workers more secure.
The U.S. government spends more on interest on the debt than it’s spending on Iraq, and a quarter of the debt is owed to foreign countries. We simply must have a government that lives within its means.
The lack of savings among Americans generally means there’s less money available for investments. What’s more, it means many American families don’t have anything to fall back on when times are tough.
Countries like China, Singapore and India are investing in top-flight communications and transportation systems, and they’re educating a whole new generation of scientists and engineers. We need to keep up.
As a nation, the U.S. wastes an enormous amount of talent, and lets far too many young people leave school without the skills to build a good future for themselves. It’s time to get serious about providing a good education for every child.
Our schools, with their patchwork of local standards and policies, just aren’t up to the demands of a global economy. We need national standards, especially in these key areas of math and science.
Math, science, engineering and technology – this is where the good jobs will be in the 21st century. We need to make sure that our kids are ready to fill them.
Arguments Against This Approach
The U.S. economy has been growing, but the benefits aren’t being shared among Americans broadly. The free market approach is opening a widening gap between rich and poor, with CEOs, investors and corporations taking the lion’s share of the profits. Very little is trickling down to average Americans.
Slashing regulations on businesses sounds good, but most of those regulations have a purpose – protecting consumers, workers and the environment from businesses that will cut corners and take risks in order to maximize profits.
This free trade, free market approach encourages companies to move jobs overseas where people work for less. And that, in turn, forces American workers to accept lower salaries and fewer benefits if they want to keep their jobs at all.
Raising taxes discourages investment and entrepreneurship and encourages bloated, inefficient government.
Policies like these have been pursued in Europe for decades. The result? Sky high unemployment and feeble economic growth.
Free trade creates as many jobs as are lost, and the ones created are in healthy, globally competitive companies.
Raising the minimum wage hurts small businesses and, in the end, means there will be fewer jobs and people without specific skills.
Putting the government in charge of health insurance will create an inefficient bureaucracy. Health costs are a burden to business, but at least now we have some competition in the system.
Raising taxes to balance the budget and throwing money at government-backed transportation and communications projects is the last thing the economy needs. Better to leave the money in the hands of citizens and businesses.
The size of the federal debt is reasonable given the size of the U.S. economy, and the fact that foreign countries want to lend money to the government just shows how much confidence there is in the U.S.
More and more Americans have a better standard of living because they have access to credit and credit cards. Sure, some people get themselves into trouble, but overall, the benefits of easier credit policies far outweigh the risks.
No matter how smart American workers are, there will probably be someone just as smart in another country who’ll work for half the salary. We need to stem the loss of jobs overseas.
Americans don’t want and won’t support an educational system that is focused almost exclusively on providing high-tech workers for industry. Americans want their kids to have well-rounded educations, and that’s always paid off for us in the past.
This approach does nothing to address the real problem in the U.S. economy – the insecurity and lack of basic health care coverage for middle-class families.
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