Obamanomics: 88 Million U.S. Adults Not Working

Eighty-eight million mostly able-bodied Americans are not working.

Today, Rush Limbaugh exposed one of the lies being spread by the Obama Administration.  That lie is that reason why the unemployment rate is dropping is because more and more Baby Boomers are retiring.  Well, the cat is out of the bag, and that "fact" is simply not true.

The truth is that only 2/3 of able-bodied Americans are working which equates to 88 million unemployed.

Read the transcript from today's show here.

Obama's Corporate Tax Rate Highest in the World

In case you missed it, the U.S. corporate rate is now the highest in the world.  The current corporate tax rate stands at 39.2 percent.  The United States was second behind Japan, until dropped it tax rate to 38.01 percent following economic struggles after last year's earthquake.  Today, the average corporate tax rate is 25 percent.

At a time when Germany cut its corporate tax rate by 22 points and Canada by 13 points, the U.S. refused to re-evaluate its corporate tax rate.  Even Russia at 20 percent and China at 25 percent, have lower tax rates than the U.S. does.  With U.S. unemployment above nine percent and U.S. forms moving operations off-shore, you would think the U.S. would re-evaluate its corporate tax rate.

What Obama fails to understand is the U.S. Treasury loses out on having the highest corporate tax rate in the world.  No longer does the U.S. have a competitive advantage amongst cheaper nations to do business in and the treasury loses out on both corporate taxes and lost personal income taxes paid to those that would be employed stateside.  For Democrats to fawn over tax revenues, they cannot connect the dots between more jobs stateside to higher tax revenues in the federal coffers.

President Obama should take heed that the Heritage Foundation, albeit a conservative think-tank, has highlighted that after-tax personal income would rise by $2,500, and over 580,000 jobs would be created per year for the next year.  Higher personal income and the repatriation  of  jobs would give the U.S. economy a welcome boost.  But political ideology seems to prevail over common sense and it is wise to not hold one's breath that Obama would listen.

Making The First State First Again

The last time a Republican has occupied the Governor’s mansion was in January 1993.  In January 1993 then Governor Michael Castle went to Washington to become Delaware’s lone Congressman and Democrat Tom Carper became Governor.    During the reigns of Tom Carper, Ruth Ann Minner and now Jack Markell, Delaware’s economy has been a roller coaster.   As of late the roller coaster ride is on the straight away track waiting for an uphill climb, but we are not sure when or if that will ever happen.

Delaware’s economy mirrors the same trajectory as the national one, with unemployment hovering over 8.2 percent.  In the last few years we have watched Delaware’s corporate landscape shrink with General Motors, Chrysler, Valero shutting down their plants sending thousands to the unemployment lines.  MBNA was sold to Bank of America and as of this writing 30,000 Bank of America employees face pink slips.  DuPont, one of Delaware’s oldest and storied employers has been shrinking its North America workforce and shipping jobs overseas as emerging markets become the growth sector.

The last twenty years in Delaware has eroded Delaware’s prominence with elected leaders ignoring the warning signs and failing to react with positive leadership to change course.  With the changing economic landscape in Delaware, what can our elected leaders do to change course? 

Make Delaware a Right To Work State – Currently, Delaware is a forced unionism state which prevents companies that do not want to hire a union workforce to avoid Delaware in favor of states that allow them to operate without forced unions.  A right to work state allows employers and its employees to decide for themselves if they would like to become a union shop.  If Delaware become a right-to-work state, Delaware would become more attractive to potential employers.

Make Delaware the Silicon Valley of the East – What propelled Delaware to world-wide prominence with du Pont, Hercules and W.L. Gore, must be the focus of the 21^st Century Delaware if we are to create high-tech, science and technology jobs.  It is unknown if Delaware will ever be a manufacturing state again or what Delaware’s banking sector will look like in the future, but Delaware must make it easier to explore research and development, including start ups in the science and technology field.  Delaware’s high schools, colleges and universities must have strong curriculums that embrace science, technology, engineering and math.  Governor Jack Markell emphasized this, but little has been done to date of making this a reality.

Deregulate Energy – While it has been tried in the past, we must deregulate the energy industry in Delaware.  Increased competition with lower rates and more advanced greener solutions will not only reduce the energy cost burdens on Delaware families and business, but will also open the gates for green technology jobs.  While the jury is still out on green jobs, America’s success has been on the trial and error of innovation entering the free markets to see what sticks and what doesn’t.  Who knows, Delaware could become the hub of green technology jobs if we let it, and do it right.  With rising costs on energy and fuel, the environment for success is ripe for the taking.

Create a Medical School in Delaware – Much talk about opening a law school in Delaware has been done, but with Delaware’s aging population health and health technology is more important than ever.  Delaware already has a law school with Widener in North Wilmington, but Delaware lacks a medical school.  The future demand on health care demand is ripe for Delaware to enter the foray of medicine and medical technology. 

Lower Tax Burden on Individuals and Businesses – Historical evidence has proven that when the tax burden is lowered on individuals and businesses, consumer confidence and spending goes up and businesses respond with higher growth and increased employment.  Lowering Delaware’s tax burden will also attracted small businesses that otherwise would not have been started to open and given an opportunity to flourish.

Remove Bureaucratic Red Tape for Business Start Ups – In order to make Delaware the economic laboratory of innovation, Delaware must become once again a center of entrepreneurship and innovation.  Delaware’s elected leaders must review all red tape and bureaucracy that hinder a business start up from happening.  Small businesses historically create the most net jobs, and this is the engine of Delaware’s economy.  Until Main Streets through Delaware are filled with store fronts and businesses, Delaware’s economic success will be nothing but a distant memory. 

Delaware’s economic success is contingent on the vision and leadership of its elected leaders.  Elections matter, and elected leaders must focus on free market enterprise, not government regulation to drive Delaware’s economic engine.  Let’s band together for a prosperous free-market Delaware.

This article was previously published in the October 2011 edition of The Conservative Caucus of Delaware's quarterly newsletter.  To become a subscriber contact ccofde@yahoo.com.

Does Jobs Report Signal Double-Dip Recession?

Let's hope not, but the unemployment numbers are not encouraging.

First, the April 2011 unemployment rate jumped up to 9.0% (up 0.2 percent from March 2011).  This uptick means more and more Americans are out of work, based on report of unemployment benefits.  And the total unemployment numbers prove that, with 15.9% percent of the American out of work as of April 30, 2011.

Graphically, Obama's economic recovery plan is failing to deliver:

Official Unemployment Rate

Total Unemployment Rate

The political outlook for President Obama looks dire.  Historically, no President has won re-election with an unemployment rate above 7.2 percent.  If the election were held today, Obama would lose.

Obama's Outsourcing of America

For being the President of the United States, President Obama is anything but a support of the United States.  For the second time in two weeks, Obama has touted foreign business over American business.  Last week while gallivanting in Brazil, Obama touted Brazilian oil.  Not once since he assumed the Presidency has Obama touted American oil development. 

And when last year's BP oil spill occurred, the Obama administration pulled all American drilling permits further enslaving America to foreign oil.  A sign that Obama does not want America to be energy independent.

Today Obama visited a Pennsylvania wind turbine manufacturer outside Philadelphia.  Obama's visit to Gamesa's  Fairless Hills plant should raise concern.  Gamesa is a Spanish wind turbine manufacturer.  How ironic that Obama could not even pay a visit to the GE Wind Energy division of General Electric, which has a plant in Connecticut. 

Nordic Windpower is another American wind turbine manufacturer, based in Kansas City, Missouri.  Northern Power Systems is another another American wind turbine manufacturer, based in Vermont.  PacWind, based in Torrance, California is another manufacturer.  Add Flagstaff, Arizona based Southwest WindPower to the list. 

What is alarming is that a simple Google search revealed five American wind turbine manufacturers that Obama could have promoted, but he had to touted a Spanish one.  So much for touting American business! 

For a President who has a Energy Secretary, what use is this department if America cannot develop energy? And the hypocrisy of Team Obama supporting American business, and jobs!  Yeah right!

Peter Schiff: 2011 U.S. Economic Predicitions

Peter Schiff, in 2006, correctly predicted the housing implosion that led to our current mega-recession. To say that Peter Schiff may be an economic prophet may be premature, but his eyes-open lens of looking at the activity of the Fed and geo-political forces should cause us all to listen.


Schiff appears to be dead on with his prediction that the U.S. is headed to a high inflationary economy given the quantitative easing by the Federal Reserve. If Americans think the economy is bad now, just wait until what is in store looking ahead.

In the embedded video clip, you also see the back and forth banter on the U.S. dollar position. It should come to no one's surprise with rising commodity and consumer prices, that the U.S. dollar is very weak. The weak dollar is directly attributed to no backing, and excessive endless printing to flood the markets with dollars. What we need to be careful is the loss of the dollar as the world's reserve currency, and that is Schiff's driving concern that will lead to long-term economic pain for the United States.

R. Lee Ermey urges Americans to fight Socialism

R. Lee Ermey, and retired U.S. Marine drill instructor and actor in the GEICO commercial has a few words for Americans on the state of the U.S. economy and where we are headed.  In doing a promotion for Toys for Tots he said that this year was problematic due to the sluggish economy.

"We are having a big problem this year (with toy donations).  The economy really sucks.  And I hate to point figures at anybody, but the present administration probably had a lot to do with it.  And the way I see it, they are not going to quit doing it until they bring this country to its knees.   So I think we should all rise up an we should stop this administration from what they are doing   because they are destroying this country.  They are driving this country into bankruptcy so they can impose Socialism on us, and that is exactly what they are doing.  I am sick and tired of it, and know you are too..."