Is This a Job-Less Recovery or a Job-Loss Recovery?

By Dr. Gerard Lameiro

In a powerful editorial this week, Investor’s Business Daily talks about our current anemic recovery with high unemployment. They point out that today’s unemployment rate of 9.6% is actually higher that when the recession ended in June 2009, a date that the National Bureau of Economic Research just announced this week. Then, it was 9.5%. So, in terms of unemployment, the recession might be over, but employment has not bounced back. Some call this a "job-less recovery." According to Investor’s Business Daily, since the recovery began in June 2009, the economy has actually lost 329,000 jobs. That makes this a JOB-LOSS recovery. In fact, the American economy requires a GDP growth rate of about 3% to create 1.5 million new jobs - the number of new jobs needed on a yearly basis to keep the unemployment rate from going up even more. [more...]

The Reagan Libertarian Contract with America

By Wayne Allyn Root

A Detailed and Specific Plan to Save the U.S. Economy

Ronald Reagan turned the worst economic slump since the Great Depression into the greatest economic turnaround and expansion in world history with one simple stroke of genius - the largest tax cut in U.S. history (ultimately reducing top marginal tax rates from 70% down to 28%). That tax cut benefited and motivated the groups that produce virtually all of the jobs and tax revenues in America - small business owners and taxpayers. These are the very groups that President Obama chooses to punish, instead of reward.

Obama redistributes money from taxpayers and small business owners to his voters who create virtually nothing, pay almost no taxes, create no jobs, and ask for handouts and entitlements from cradle to grave. In short, Obama’s voters are bankrupting this once great country. This is precisely why the U.S. economy has fallen off a cliff. We are staring at the abyss - economic Armageddon, chronic massive unemployment, and worldwide depression. It is time for dramatic measures to stave off disaster, deficit, debt and depression.

It is time for a Reagan Libertarian contract with America - a daring plan aimed squarely at motivating entrepreneurs, small business owners, and taxpayers. These are the people who risk, invest and build America. Without their cooperation, motivation and success, there can be no recovery. This daring plan is the polar opposite of the Obama socialist plan. But unlike Republican plans, it places equal importance on limiting the size of government, shrinking spending, and limiting the power of politicians, as opposed to simply cutting taxes. [more...]

Is the Great Recession Over? Will the 2nd Great Recession Start in 2011?

By Dr. Gerard Lameiro

If the National Bureau of Economic Research pegs the Great Recession over in June 2009, I think most economists would agree the recession is over. So, what can be said of the economy today? Certainly, the recovery has been very weak. Unemployment is still high at 9.6% with about 42% of the unemployed unable to get a job for 27 or more weeks. This represents very high, long-term unemployment. The U-6 metric of unemployment that includes additional categories of unemployed workers (such as discouraged workers and those who want full-time work but settle for part-time employment) is almost 17%. Just think, one in seven Americans can’t find a full-time job. That’s abysmal. [more...]

Why Has It Been a Tumultuous Primary Season?

By Dr. Gerard Lameiro

With incumbents often in trouble, establishment candidates facing tough challengers, and tea party activists heavily involved, tumultuous is a good word to describe what we have seen thus far. The Wall Street Journal published a related op-ed piece this week that might help to answer these questions. The article by Arthur C. Brooks (President of the American Enterprise Institute) and Paul Ryan (Congressman from the State of Wisconsin) offer their explanation of the true decisions Americans are making this electoral season. According to Brooks and Ryan, behind all the campaigns and candidates and rhetoric, is really a fundamental question. Do Americans want the traditional American system of free enterprise, limited government, and low taxes? Or, do Americans want to replace our system with a European-style social democracy (also known as welfare state socialism)? [more...]

Will Another $50 Billion Stimulus Kick-Start Our Economy?

By Dr. Gerard Lameiro

Jobs. Jobs. Jobs. It’s at the top of all the headlines this week. It’s the number one story and it’s being debated coast-to-coast. President Obama is proposing another $50 billion stimulus package for roads, runways and railways to boost our economy - in other words, to create jobs by building our transportation infrastructure. The president is also proposing a $200 billion tax credit for business in the form of a short-term research and experimentation tax credit that lasts through 2011. That’s a temporary boost to business. Will such a short-term business tax credit boost our economy? Will another $50 billion stimulus package kick-start our economy? [more...]