The Candidates on The Economy
Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 3:16 pm
Bob Barr
Every area of federal spending can and should be cut. Entitlements must be reformed and welfare should be cut, including subsidies for business sometimes called corporate welfare. Military outlays should be reduced and pork barrel spending eliminated. Needless, duplicative, and wasteful programs, most of which have no constitutional basis, should be terminated.
Controlling government spending is a necessary step to enact true tax reform, which will reduce the burden on all Americans and allow them to keep more of their hard-earned money.
We should seek to establish a wall of separation between government and the economy. The legitimate economic functions of government are to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected. The government should stop attempting to “manage the free market.
Capitalism is the only economic system that rewards risk, protects individual liberty, and furthers economic freedom. America will be most prosperous and free when the government stops interfering with private economic decision-making.
Barack Obama
Jumpstart the Economy
Provide Additional Tax Rebates to American Workers: Stimulus: $20 billion.
Establish a $10 billion Foreclosure Prevention Fund:
Provide $10 billion in Relief for State and Local Governments Hardest-Hit by the Housing Crisis to Prevent Cuts in Vital Services:
Provide Middle Class Americans Tax Relief
Obama will cut income taxes by $1,000 for working families to offset the payroll tax they pay.
Provide a Tax Cut for Working Families: Obama will restore fairness to the tax code and provide 150 million workers the tax relief they need. Obama will create a new "Making Work Pay" tax credit of up to $500 per person, or $1,000 per working family. The "Making Work Pay" tax credit will completely eliminate income taxes for 10 million Americans.
Eliminate Income Taxes for Seniors Making Less than $50,000: Barack Obama will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This proposal will eliminate income taxes for 7 million seniors and provide these seniors with an average savings of $1,400 each year. Under the Obama plan, 27 million American seniors will also not need to file an income tax return.
Simplify Tax Filings for Middle Class Americans: Obama will dramatically simplify tax filings so that millions of Americans will be able to do their taxes in less than five minutes. Obama will ensure that the IRS uses the information it already gets from banks and employers to give taxpayers the option of pre-filled tax forms to verify, sign and return. Experts estimate that the Obama proposal will save Americans up to 200 million total hours of work and aggravation and up to $2 billion in tax preparer fees.
Trade
Obama believes that trade with foreign nations should strengthen the American economy and create more American jobs. He will stand firm against agreements that undermine our economic security.
Fight for Fair Trade:
Amend the North American Free Trade Agreement:
Improve Transition Assistance:
Invest in the Manufacturing Sector and Create 5 Million New Green Jobs
Invest in our Next Generation Innovators and Job Creators: based on the Michigan 21st Century Jobs Fund, a state-level initiative.
Double Funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership:
Invest In A Clean Energy Economy And Create 5 Million New Green Jobs: $150 billion over 10 years
Create New Job Training Programs for Clean Technologies:
Boost the Renewable Energy Sector and Create New Jobs:
New Jobs Through National Infrastructure Investment
Barack Obama believes that it is critically important for the United States to rebuild its national transportation infrastructure – its highways, bridges, roads, ports, air, and train systems – to strengthen user safety, bolster our long-term competitiveness and ensure our economy continues to grow.
Create a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank:
Technology, Innovation and Creating Jobs
Barack Obama will increase federal support for research, technology and innovation for companies and universities so that American families can lead the world in creating new advanced jobs and products.
Invest in the Sciences:
Make the Research and Development Tax Credit Permanent:
Deploy Next-Generation Broadband:
Support Small Business
Provide Tax Relief for Small Businesses and Start Up Companies:
Create a National Network of Public-Private Business Incubators:
Labor
Obama will strengthen the ability of workers to organize unions. He will fight for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act. Obama will ensure that his labor appointees support workers' rights and will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers. Obama will also increase the minimum wage and index it to inflation to ensure it rises every year.
Ensure Freedom to Unionize: Obama believes that workers should have the freedom to choose whether to join a union without harassment or intimidation from their employers. Obama cosponsored and is strong advocate for the Employee Free Choice Act, a bipartisan effort to assure that workers can exercise their right to organize. He will continue to fight for EFCA's passage and sign it into law.
Fight Attacks on Workers' Right to Organize: Obama has fought the Bush National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) efforts to strip workers of their right to organize. He is a cosponsor of legislation to overturn the NLRB's "Kentucky River" decisions classifying hundreds of thousands of nurses, construction, and professional workers as "supervisors" who are not protected by federal labor laws.
Protect Striking Workers: Obama supports the right of workers to bargain collectively and strike if necessary. He will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers, so workers can stand up for themselves without worrying about losing their livelihoods.
Raise the Minimum Wage: Barack Obama will raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs.
Protect Homeownership and Crack Down on Mortgage Fraud
Obama will crack down on fraudulent brokers and lenders. He will also make sure homebuyers have honest and complete information about their mortgage options, and he will give a tax credit to all middle-class homeowners.
Create a New FHA Housing Security Program:
Create a Universal Mortgage Credit:
Ensure More Accountability in the Subprime Mortgage Industry:
Create Fund to Help Homeowners Avoid Foreclosures:
Close Bankruptcy Loophole for Mortgage Companies:
Address Predatory Credit Card Practices
Obama will establish a five-star rating system so that every consumer knows the risk involved in every credit card. He also will establish a Credit Card Bill of Rights to stop credit card companies from exploiting consumers with unfair practices.
Create a Credit Card Rating System to Improve Disclosure:
Establish a Credit Card Bill of Rights to Protect Consumers:
Reform Bankruptcy Laws
Obama will reform our bankruptcy laws to protect working people, ban executive bonuses for bankrupt companies, and require disclosure of all pension investments.
Cap Outlandish Interest Rates on Payday Loans and Improve Disclosure: Obama supports extending a 36 percent interest cap to all Americans. Obama will require lenders to provide clear and simplified information about loan fees, payments and penalties, which is why he'll require lenders to provide this information during the application process.
Encourage Responsible Lending Institutions to Make Small Consumer Loans: Obama will encourage banks, credit unions and Community Development Financial Institutions to provide affordable short-term and small-dollar loans and to drive unscrupulous lenders out of business.
Reform Bankruptcy Laws to Protect Families Facing a Medical Crisis: Obama will create an exemption in bankruptcy law for individuals who can prove they filed for bankruptcy because of medical expenses. This exemption will create a process that forgives the debt and lets the individuals get back on their feet.
Work/Family Balance
Obama will double funding for after-school programs, expand the Family Medical Leave Act, provide low-income families with a refundable tax credit to help with their child-care expenses, and encourage flexible work schedules.
Expand the Family and Medical Leave Act:
Encourage States to Adopt Paid Leave:
Expand High-Quality Afterschool Opportunities:
Expand the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit:
Protect Against Caregiver Discrimination:
Expand Flexible Work Arrangements:
John McCain
John McCain believes we should institute a summer gas tax holiday. Hard-working American families are suffering from higher gasoline prices. John McCain called on Congress to suspend the 18.4 cent federal gas tax and 24.4 cent diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
John McCain will repeal the 54 cents per gallon tax on imported sugar-based ethanol, increasing competition, and lowering prices of gasoline at the pump.
John McCain will roll back corn-based ethanol mandates, which are contributing to the rising cost of food.
Home Plan
John McCain believes there is nothing more important than keeping alive the American dream of owning a home. Priority number one is to keep well-meaning, deserving home owners who are facing foreclosure in their homes.
John McCain's approach to helping sub-prime or other financially strapped mortgage borrowers is built on sound principles:
How It Works: Individuals pick up a form at any Post Office or download the form over the Internet and apply for a HOME loan. The FHA HOME Office certifies that the individual is qualified, and contacts the individual's mortgage servicer. The mortgage servicer writes down and retires the existing loan, which is replaced by an FHA guaranteed HOME loan from a lender.
[In Washington,]John McCain will balance the budget by the end of his first term.
McCain Policies Will Support Reasonable Economic Growth: Small business is the key to job growth. Small business will benefit from Low individual tax rates, Access to capital from low tax rates on dividends and capital gains, Minimizing expensive mandates such as those for health insurance and pro-union initiatives like card check, Enhancing international competitiveness to keep jobs here, A lower corporate tax rate, and Improved investment and research incentives to ensure that workers have the most modern technology.
John McCain will institute broad reforms to control spending.
A one-year spending pause. Freeze non-defense, non-veterans discretionary spending for a year and use those savings for deficit reduction.
Take back earmark funds. The McCain Administration will reclaim billions of add-on spending from earmarks and add-ons in FY 2007 and 2008.
Bi-partisan Fiscal Discipline: A McCain Administration will provide the leadership to achieve bipartisan spending restraint equivalent to that in the 1997 Balanced Budget Agreement between a GOP Congress and a Democratic President. In 1997, President Clinton and the GOP Congress agreed to balance the budget by restraining the growth in spending and cutting taxes over a ten-year period.
Stop Earmarks, Pork-Barrel Spending, And Waste: John McCain will veto every pork-laden spending bill and make their authors famous.
Opening New Markets
John McCain believes that globalization is an opportunity for American workers today and in the future.
Energy
Nuclear - 45 new nuclear plants by 2030
Coal - $2 billion annually to advancing clean coal technologies
Wind, hydro, solar - John McCain believes in an even- handed system of tax credits that will remain in place until renewable energy has progressed to the point that it is competitive with conventional energy sources.
Oil - Expand domestic oil and natural gas exploration.
Battery Technology - John McCain will propose a $300 million prize to improve battery technology for full commercial development of plug-in hybrid and fully electric automobiles.
Transportation alternatives - John McCain will offer incentives to produce better and cheaper flex-fuel alternative fuel vehicles
Homes - Homeowners can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year with better light bulbs, appliances, windows, and insulation.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Barr has good broad ideas but no substance here. Obama's plans sound like local & state gov't initiatives; he's running for president, not governor. McCain's plans are too comprehensive and reach too far outside his constitutional job description, but nowhere near as far as Obama's.
For me: No points to anyone.
Every area of federal spending can and should be cut. Entitlements must be reformed and welfare should be cut, including subsidies for business sometimes called corporate welfare. Military outlays should be reduced and pork barrel spending eliminated. Needless, duplicative, and wasteful programs, most of which have no constitutional basis, should be terminated.
Controlling government spending is a necessary step to enact true tax reform, which will reduce the burden on all Americans and allow them to keep more of their hard-earned money.
We should seek to establish a wall of separation between government and the economy. The legitimate economic functions of government are to protect property rights, adjudicate disputes, and provide a legal framework in which voluntary trade is protected. The government should stop attempting to “manage the free market.
Capitalism is the only economic system that rewards risk, protects individual liberty, and furthers economic freedom. America will be most prosperous and free when the government stops interfering with private economic decision-making.
Barack Obama
Jumpstart the Economy
Provide Additional Tax Rebates to American Workers: Stimulus: $20 billion.
Establish a $10 billion Foreclosure Prevention Fund:
Provide $10 billion in Relief for State and Local Governments Hardest-Hit by the Housing Crisis to Prevent Cuts in Vital Services:
Provide Middle Class Americans Tax Relief
Obama will cut income taxes by $1,000 for working families to offset the payroll tax they pay.
Provide a Tax Cut for Working Families: Obama will restore fairness to the tax code and provide 150 million workers the tax relief they need. Obama will create a new "Making Work Pay" tax credit of up to $500 per person, or $1,000 per working family. The "Making Work Pay" tax credit will completely eliminate income taxes for 10 million Americans.
Eliminate Income Taxes for Seniors Making Less than $50,000: Barack Obama will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This proposal will eliminate income taxes for 7 million seniors and provide these seniors with an average savings of $1,400 each year. Under the Obama plan, 27 million American seniors will also not need to file an income tax return.
Simplify Tax Filings for Middle Class Americans: Obama will dramatically simplify tax filings so that millions of Americans will be able to do their taxes in less than five minutes. Obama will ensure that the IRS uses the information it already gets from banks and employers to give taxpayers the option of pre-filled tax forms to verify, sign and return. Experts estimate that the Obama proposal will save Americans up to 200 million total hours of work and aggravation and up to $2 billion in tax preparer fees.
Trade
Obama believes that trade with foreign nations should strengthen the American economy and create more American jobs. He will stand firm against agreements that undermine our economic security.
Fight for Fair Trade:
Amend the North American Free Trade Agreement:
Improve Transition Assistance:
Invest in the Manufacturing Sector and Create 5 Million New Green Jobs
Invest in our Next Generation Innovators and Job Creators: based on the Michigan 21st Century Jobs Fund, a state-level initiative.
Double Funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership:
Invest In A Clean Energy Economy And Create 5 Million New Green Jobs: $150 billion over 10 years
Create New Job Training Programs for Clean Technologies:
Boost the Renewable Energy Sector and Create New Jobs:
New Jobs Through National Infrastructure Investment
Barack Obama believes that it is critically important for the United States to rebuild its national transportation infrastructure – its highways, bridges, roads, ports, air, and train systems – to strengthen user safety, bolster our long-term competitiveness and ensure our economy continues to grow.
Create a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank:
Technology, Innovation and Creating Jobs
Barack Obama will increase federal support for research, technology and innovation for companies and universities so that American families can lead the world in creating new advanced jobs and products.
Invest in the Sciences:
Make the Research and Development Tax Credit Permanent:
Deploy Next-Generation Broadband:
Support Small Business
Provide Tax Relief for Small Businesses and Start Up Companies:
Create a National Network of Public-Private Business Incubators:
Labor
Obama will strengthen the ability of workers to organize unions. He will fight for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act. Obama will ensure that his labor appointees support workers' rights and will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers. Obama will also increase the minimum wage and index it to inflation to ensure it rises every year.
Ensure Freedom to Unionize: Obama believes that workers should have the freedom to choose whether to join a union without harassment or intimidation from their employers. Obama cosponsored and is strong advocate for the Employee Free Choice Act, a bipartisan effort to assure that workers can exercise their right to organize. He will continue to fight for EFCA's passage and sign it into law.
Fight Attacks on Workers' Right to Organize: Obama has fought the Bush National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) efforts to strip workers of their right to organize. He is a cosponsor of legislation to overturn the NLRB's "Kentucky River" decisions classifying hundreds of thousands of nurses, construction, and professional workers as "supervisors" who are not protected by federal labor laws.
Protect Striking Workers: Obama supports the right of workers to bargain collectively and strike if necessary. He will work to ban the permanent replacement of striking workers, so workers can stand up for themselves without worrying about losing their livelihoods.
Raise the Minimum Wage: Barack Obama will raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs.
Protect Homeownership and Crack Down on Mortgage Fraud
Obama will crack down on fraudulent brokers and lenders. He will also make sure homebuyers have honest and complete information about their mortgage options, and he will give a tax credit to all middle-class homeowners.
Create a New FHA Housing Security Program:
Create a Universal Mortgage Credit:
Ensure More Accountability in the Subprime Mortgage Industry:
Create Fund to Help Homeowners Avoid Foreclosures:
Close Bankruptcy Loophole for Mortgage Companies:
Address Predatory Credit Card Practices
Obama will establish a five-star rating system so that every consumer knows the risk involved in every credit card. He also will establish a Credit Card Bill of Rights to stop credit card companies from exploiting consumers with unfair practices.
Create a Credit Card Rating System to Improve Disclosure:
Establish a Credit Card Bill of Rights to Protect Consumers:
Reform Bankruptcy Laws
Obama will reform our bankruptcy laws to protect working people, ban executive bonuses for bankrupt companies, and require disclosure of all pension investments.
Cap Outlandish Interest Rates on Payday Loans and Improve Disclosure: Obama supports extending a 36 percent interest cap to all Americans. Obama will require lenders to provide clear and simplified information about loan fees, payments and penalties, which is why he'll require lenders to provide this information during the application process.
Encourage Responsible Lending Institutions to Make Small Consumer Loans: Obama will encourage banks, credit unions and Community Development Financial Institutions to provide affordable short-term and small-dollar loans and to drive unscrupulous lenders out of business.
Reform Bankruptcy Laws to Protect Families Facing a Medical Crisis: Obama will create an exemption in bankruptcy law for individuals who can prove they filed for bankruptcy because of medical expenses. This exemption will create a process that forgives the debt and lets the individuals get back on their feet.
Work/Family Balance
Obama will double funding for after-school programs, expand the Family Medical Leave Act, provide low-income families with a refundable tax credit to help with their child-care expenses, and encourage flexible work schedules.
Expand the Family and Medical Leave Act:
Encourage States to Adopt Paid Leave:
Expand High-Quality Afterschool Opportunities:
Expand the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit:
Protect Against Caregiver Discrimination:
Expand Flexible Work Arrangements:
John McCain
John McCain believes we should institute a summer gas tax holiday. Hard-working American families are suffering from higher gasoline prices. John McCain called on Congress to suspend the 18.4 cent federal gas tax and 24.4 cent diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
John McCain will repeal the 54 cents per gallon tax on imported sugar-based ethanol, increasing competition, and lowering prices of gasoline at the pump.
John McCain will roll back corn-based ethanol mandates, which are contributing to the rising cost of food.
Home Plan
John McCain believes there is nothing more important than keeping alive the American dream of owning a home. Priority number one is to keep well-meaning, deserving home owners who are facing foreclosure in their homes.
John McCain's approach to helping sub-prime or other financially strapped mortgage borrowers is built on sound principles:
How It Works: Individuals pick up a form at any Post Office or download the form over the Internet and apply for a HOME loan. The FHA HOME Office certifies that the individual is qualified, and contacts the individual's mortgage servicer. The mortgage servicer writes down and retires the existing loan, which is replaced by an FHA guaranteed HOME loan from a lender.
[In Washington,]John McCain will balance the budget by the end of his first term.
McCain Policies Will Support Reasonable Economic Growth: Small business is the key to job growth. Small business will benefit from Low individual tax rates, Access to capital from low tax rates on dividends and capital gains, Minimizing expensive mandates such as those for health insurance and pro-union initiatives like card check, Enhancing international competitiveness to keep jobs here, A lower corporate tax rate, and Improved investment and research incentives to ensure that workers have the most modern technology.
John McCain will institute broad reforms to control spending.
A one-year spending pause. Freeze non-defense, non-veterans discretionary spending for a year and use those savings for deficit reduction.
Take back earmark funds. The McCain Administration will reclaim billions of add-on spending from earmarks and add-ons in FY 2007 and 2008.
Bi-partisan Fiscal Discipline: A McCain Administration will provide the leadership to achieve bipartisan spending restraint equivalent to that in the 1997 Balanced Budget Agreement between a GOP Congress and a Democratic President. In 1997, President Clinton and the GOP Congress agreed to balance the budget by restraining the growth in spending and cutting taxes over a ten-year period.
Stop Earmarks, Pork-Barrel Spending, And Waste: John McCain will veto every pork-laden spending bill and make their authors famous.
Opening New Markets
John McCain believes that globalization is an opportunity for American workers today and in the future.
Energy
Nuclear - 45 new nuclear plants by 2030
Coal - $2 billion annually to advancing clean coal technologies
Wind, hydro, solar - John McCain believes in an even- handed system of tax credits that will remain in place until renewable energy has progressed to the point that it is competitive with conventional energy sources.
Oil - Expand domestic oil and natural gas exploration.
Battery Technology - John McCain will propose a $300 million prize to improve battery technology for full commercial development of plug-in hybrid and fully electric automobiles.
Transportation alternatives - John McCain will offer incentives to produce better and cheaper flex-fuel alternative fuel vehicles
Homes - Homeowners can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year with better light bulbs, appliances, windows, and insulation.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Barr has good broad ideas but no substance here. Obama's plans sound like local & state gov't initiatives; he's running for president, not governor. McCain's plans are too comprehensive and reach too far outside his constitutional job description, but nowhere near as far as Obama's.
For me: No points to anyone.