Tax cuts may only offer temporary economic relief

Blaze Bishop
Guest Commentator

   No, no, no, no, no! After reading the article "Cutting taxes, growing debt and no weapons of mass destruction." in the Oct 10 edition of the B&M I simply cannot accept these kind of public statements anymore. It has nothing to do with content, the article actually rambled around some very good points and ideas that need to be examined. What I can no longer stand is the sloppy, unfinished, and weak way these kind of articles try to present or argue something. I truly believe that this kind of work does more damage for a position you are advocating than not writing anything.

   So instead of just ranting about how other people can't do something, I am going to try to rewrite the section about the tax cuts in this article how I think it should be done, I really would like to see some responses as to which conveys a stronger message and looks like we actually learn something in our liberal arts education.

   We have another presidential election next year and our current President continues to pursue controversial policies that I believe show his incompetence to lead for another four years. One of the latest is his new tax plan. This plan cuts the taxes paid on stock dividends, capital gains, and small business investments. This is a plan to encourage investors and businesses to put more money into new investments and expansions. The intent is to stimulate the economy by giving a greater profit motive to the people and institutions that have the resources to create jobs and invest in the economy. Since the majority of Americans have very low savings rates, giving the same tax cut to the lower income levels will just turn into an increase in consumption, instead of being an increase in savings or investment.

   The reason I disagree with this policy is that the recent trend in employment show a rise in temporary and outsourced jobs. While it is still employment these jobs are not considered good in the way that they build a career or have long term stability. I believe that the effects of this tax cut will cause an increase in current operations of industries, and not a increase in new or different industries. If the investments that are stimulated by the tax cuts are just used to hire temporary employees to increase the output of the current operations then the economic stimulation is a temporary fix instead of an investment in the infrastructure that would provide long term benefits The increased employment does help to stimulate the economy but I question the quality of the stimulation. Are we really better off giving the people in the upper income levels these breaks that increase their income due to a short term increases in output while creating only temporary or low wage jobs that follow the recent trends? Are there other options that will stimulate the economy and provide a better quality of long term or career employment? I feel this kind of tax cut is simply a ploy to give a quick and dirty stimulation to the economy that will boost sales and employment figures just in time for a re-election campaign. The after effects will be cutbacks in the low income jobs in the next downturn of the business cycle, greater separation in the income gap, and an increase in the disappearance of the middle class. I believe a responsible economic policy would be one that creates long term jobs with a emphasis on careers and a wage that can comfortably support a family.

   The thoughtless and shortsightedness of this kind of policy is irresponsible and shows no care for the long term well-being of our country and it's citizens. For these reasons I think President Bush is incompetent and should not be re-elected to the presidency.

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