Power To The People: The Citizens Stimulus Plan

President Obama has just signed the latest stimulus package, spending nearly $800B of our money. And we all know that our federal government is already planning the next $700B stimulus package. The current program is thousands of pages long and I believe it is 6 inches thick. Just imagine the mess we have ahead of us. Every American fears the money will just be wasted; the stock market has already had a terrible reaction to the bill.

That's why I would like to propose my very simple two-point plan on how to stimulate the economy. My plan will fix the economy and give the US citizens total control of the spending.

First, let's provide 20 million people vouchers for $10,000 each that are redeemable towards the purchase of a new car at any US car dealership. It does not matter if it is "foreign" made or not. Most knowledgeable people understand that it does not matter if it is a Ford or Toyota. If you buy a Toyota at a Toyota dealer in the US, you save jobs at that dealership, jobs at all the suppliers for that dealer, jobs at the manufacturing plants, jobs at the parts distributors, and so on. You also provide tax revenue that your state governments desperately need. This would cost $200B ($10,000 X 20M = $200B) and would flow through the entire economy, putting America back to work. If it turns out it helps Japan, Korea and UK auto makers too, then great. We need their economies to succeed as well. Of course, we have to determine exactly who gets these vouchers. I would choose the 20 million people who had the lowest 2008 earnings according to their tax returns. It also would mean only tax paying, US citizens would be eligible. The IRS should be able to have this list ready in an afternoon.

Second, let's provide 20 million heads of household a voucher or tax rebate of $25,000 toward the purchase of a new home. For some inexplicable reason, this was drastically changed at the last minute in the current plan. Instead of handing this money to financial institutions to mismanage, let it flow to them through the actual purchase of homes. This will stimulate the financial sectors, the construction industry, the retailers who sell products to home builders and home owners, the service industries that support home owners, and countless others. This would cost $500B ($25,000 X 20M = $500B) and would flow through the entire economy putting America back to work. Similar to the new car plan, I would choose the 20 million head of households who had the lowest earnings according to their tax returns. Again, it means only tax paying, US citizens would be eligible.

Of course Democrats and Republicans will have to debate this, turn it into a 500 page document with lots of favors and pork in it. Or maybe not! If the citizens rise up and tell them we won't take it anymore, maybe, just maybe, we can get a simple measure passed that is a huge step in fixing our (and the World's) economy. Once we start buying cars and homes, everything else will take care of itself. Even foreclosures will start to take care of themselves as the housing market begins growing again. Besides, the previous bailout plans were designed to help stabilize the banks right?

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