I commend the president for acknowledging today that “there are limits to what government can and should do” to ease our 10.2% unemployment rate – the highest it’s been since 1983. I also applaud his call for suggestions and expression of openness to considering “any demonstrably good idea.” Taking him at his word, I’d like to suggest this one: let’s learn from history and follow the example of the man who occupied the White House in 1983 and was able to transform an even worse recession than the one we’re currently experiencing into the largest peacetime economic expansion in American history.
When you realize the magnitude of President Reagan’s achievements, there is absolutely no reason why anyone would ignore his “demonstrably good” example. If you want real job growth, cut taxes – including capital gains taxes and small business payroll taxes – and slay the death tax once and for all. If you want to stimulate the economy and help poor and middle class families, cut payroll taxes so that more Americans can keep and invest more of what they earn.
If you want lasting economic expansion and prosperity, get the federal government’s budget under control. Instead of more pork-laden stimulus plans, let the free market correct itself. That’s what Reagan did, and history proves it worked.
In his comments today, the president honorably suggested that he welcomes our ideas on how to put America’s economy on the right track. But, there also seemed to be a suggested chastisement of the private sector’s efforts to right some economic wrongs when he said, “…small businesses and large firms…have not yet been willing to take the steps necessary to hire again.”
As business owners seek to expand, or just to keep doors open today, it’s not as if they are refusing to hire out of spite. Given a pro-private sector environment they will be only too happy to hire more people and grow their businesses. Perhaps if leadership in Washington reassured them by, for example, cutting tax burdens and making government more efficient, it would send our businesses a message that it’s safe and smart to expand today.
These are difficult times for so many Americans who are out of work. I implore our leaders to not threaten our economy’s job creators with increased taxes and job-killing schemes like cap-and-tax and the government health care takeover. Government needs to get out of their way and off their backs so that they can grow and hire again. The lessons of history are clear. We’re blessed to have so many lessons from which to learn, and we’d be smart to emulate successes in America’s past. Our economic recovery decisions should be based on the same free market principles that Reagan employed. They work, history proves it, and I thank our president for asking for this input.
