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Speak Out
What can the government do to create jobs?
By John Vettese, Student Voices staff writer
Across the United States, jobs are scarce. In September, the Bureau of Labor statistics reported 9.1 percent of the workforce is unemployed. The unemployment rate for people your age – 16 to 19 years old – is 24.5 percent.
While demonstrators from the Occupy movement rally against corporate greed and unequal distribution of wealth, President Barack Obama is traveling the country stumping for his jobs plan – which he says can put 2 million Americans back to work.
But Congress did not agree with his approach, and rejected it in a vote in early October.
Obama’s plan would:
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Temporarily cut Social Security taxes on workers and businesses to the tune of $270 billion.
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Provide $175 billion for repairs to highways, schools and other federal infrastructure.
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Provide local governments with money to avoid layoffs of police, firefighters and teachers.
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Be financed by a 5.6 percent surcharge on income over $1 million.
The surcharge on the wealthy was one of the factors behind Congress’ rejection. Say a person makes a flat $1 million each year – they’d pay $56,000. Obama says this could raise $450 billion over the next decade, and could help the country’s economy improve; critics argue that citizens should not be punished for successfully acquiring wealth.
In addition, opponents say Obama’s overall plan makes the country’s tax system more complex than it needs to be. In a speech, Speaker of the House John Boehner told reporters, “The instinct in government, always, is to get bigger, more intrusive, more meddlesome. And that instinct is at direct odds with the things that make the American economy move.”
Republicans say their jobs’ plan, the Jobs Through Growth Act, will create more than 5 million jobs. It calls for a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, a repeal of Obama’s health care law and financial overhaul, a moratorium on new regulations and medical malpractice reform, among other reforms.
Obama remained undeterred by Congress’ rejection of his bill, and has taken to the road to campaign for both his jobs plan and his reelection. He told a crowd in Asheville, N.C., that he wants the jobs plan to be broken up into pieces and then voted on again, one item at a time.
“Maybe [Congress] just couldn’t understand the whole all at once,” Obama told the crowd.
The first piece is the Teachers and First Responders Back to Work Act, the portion of Obama’s plan that would provide $35 billion to local governments to avoid layoffs.
What do you think?
What can the government do to create jobs? Which proposals would be effective? Is it fair that Obama wants millionaires to pay a surcharge on their income? What do you think of asking Congress to vote on his plan one part at a time? Join the discussion!
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