Enough With Artificial Economic Stimuli

Trying to fix an economy that's largely in the hole largely because of the ephemerality of previous artificial stimuli like the 2001 Bush tax cuts or the constant lowering of interest rates combined with Greenspan's encouragement for people to take ARM mortgages, Bush is launching another artificial, reckless economic stimulus package:

Bush said that Congress and the administration need to settle on a temporary economic package that could be implemented quickly to "keep our economy growing and create jobs." While Bush focused on taxes, Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress have been working on a package that would also include extending and perhaps increasing unemployment benefits and a temporary increase in food stamps.

"Letting Americans keep more of their money should increase consumer spending," he said.
Bush outlined several criteria for the package to meet: It must be "big enough to make a difference in an economy as large and dynamic as ours," it must be built on "broad-based tax relief," it must take effect right away but be temporary, and it must not include any tax increases.

Specifically, he called for tax incentives for businesses, including small companies, to make new and major investments this year. "Giving them an incentive to invest now will encourage business owners to expand their operations, create new jobs and inject new energy into our economy in the process," Bush said.

He also called for tax relief for individuals — probably to come in the form of one-time rebates. But he did not say how much money Americans would get to keep or the amount of other tax incentives that could be in the package. Nor did Bush detail how the nation would pay for such a plan.

Of course not. But you'll get a little money back to distract you from our trillion-dollar debt and from the fact that most of the tax breaks will go to corporations and people much wealthier than you (well, most of you):

A White House plan is looking at rebates of up to $800 for individuals and $1,600 for married couples.

Incredible.

Update: From the awesome Atrios, who follows the economy better than any other blogger I read regularly (and after having mono, I now have a ton that I do read regularly -- wait until I update the Daily Rounds list):

John Hardwood said the proposed stimulus would involve checks cut to people and the checks would be a "credit against the payroll tax."

Wonder if he was being precise. If so, the money's coming out of those social security file cabinets instead of general revenue.

Labels: Economy, George Bush

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