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September 11, 2009 By Steve Selengut
My recent survey produced a variety of
ideas, but most of them had these common elements: replace the
Internal Revenue Code with a simpler model, encourage businesses
to increase employment, and insist upon tort reform everywhere.
It also brought two disturbing
realities into focus: We are painfully apathetic (less than 1%
of the people I contacted took the time to respond) and,
although we have great problem-solving ideas, few to none of
them are included in any of the reforms being considered by
congress.
For those who participated, thank you
again. I hope that you will appreciate how I've synthesized your
thoughts and suggestions into the commentary. I also hope that
you will find the time to address some of these issues more
aggressively with blogs, networks, and elected officials.
Major changes are being proposed in six
inter-related areas. All the dots cannot be connected in one
article. Government revenue is cut in this article and the next
without a hint about a replacement plan. I'll get to that later,
and painlessly for all of us.
So how do we create more jobs?
Perhaps the first step in creating more
jobs is to take a giant step backwards and define what a job is.
In the simplest of terms, your job is the principal moneymaking
activity in your life.
The more qualifications and skills you
have (physical, technical, intellectual, etc.) the more valuable
you are to employers, customers, and clients. Thus, more
practical, job specific, education becomes a vital part of the
jobs picture.
For the self-employed, the amount of
effort expended, marketing skills, and the product or service
itself is as important as the qualifications. But the objective
of the job, the career, and the company, is to make money.
Government jobs are of a service,
regulatory, and social problem solving nature--- unquestionably
necessary, but the primary motive is not to create personal
wealth or economic gain, hence the thousand-dollar toilet seat
scenario. These jobs are paid for by taxes collected from all
employed people--- except our friends in the "underground
economy", who pay virtually no taxes at all.
The more government jobs, the more
taxation; the more government regulation, the more need for cost
analysis of the regulations spewed forth. Consumers ultimately
pay all of the costs of compliance, everywhere.
Most self-employed people start off
working for others; large or small really doesn't matter. What
matters is that employers hire these people to make the
enterprise more productive, safer, more efficient, and more
profitable.
In theory, employees must contribute to
profitability, and each is compensated based on his or her
contribution, as determined by the owners of the enterprise. In
larger organizations self-serving executives are able to pillage
the profits of the enterprise, to the detriment of both owners
and employees.
Employee benefit programs (health &
dental insurance, pension & savings programs, investment
education plans) were originally implemented to attract and
retain the best employees.
Today, employers are reluctant to
create jobs because the mandated non-productive "overhead"
associated with each worker adds significantly to the cost of
running the business--- worker's compensation, unemployment
insurance, OSHA compliance, liability insurance, social security
contributions, minimum wage/union pay scales, etc.
No job deserves to exist economically
if it doesn't add to the profitability of the business. The more
costs per employee, the fewer jobs get created. So how do we
create more jobs in this environment?
Corporate Income and Nuisance
Taxes.
Politicians have succeeded in
demonizing the large corporation by exploiting the greed of
obscenely overpaid executives and employees, while ignoring
their own complicity in the conflicts of interest and lobbyist
graft that steer the legislation they produce.
What Congress, a long line of
Presidents, and much of the population have lost sight of is the
fact that even the dirtier businesses are job providers. They
must be pampered, not pummeled; supervised and reined in but not
tethered and broken.
Business income taxes are 100%
inflationary; costs associated with employees (yes, even the
minimum wage, which some suggest is the cause of our illegal
alien problems) result in fewer employees hired. Period.
Capitalism is not broken--- its success formula has been
compromised.
Repealing the corporate income tax, and
prohibiting any and all levies, fees, charges, and taxes on any
form of business could instantly produce millions of job
openings, lower prices, and create new business opportunities
throughout the economy.
Repealing business income taxes would
instantly make export products more competitive in world
markets, as businesses reduce prices while maintaining profit
margins. Greater profits should translate into growth in
economic activity.
Finally, the elimination of these taxes
would make all businesses run more effectively because there
would be no need to spend money (or create losing transactions)
just to cut the tax bill.
Government Programs:
Tax dollars can create jobs when they
are used to: protect consumers and businesses from fraudulent
and disruptive forces, fund infrastructure repairs and
improvements, protect shareholders from greedy officers and
directors, provide free education to the most talented students
in all fields, and provide seed capital for new public interest
development projects.
Steve Selengut is the author of "The
Brainwashing of the American Investor: The Book that Wall Street
Does Not Want YOU to Read", and "A Millionaire's Secret
Investment Strategy"
http://www.kiawahgolfinvestmentseminars.com
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