The Great Bush Recession saw the loss of 8 million jobs in less than 9 months. Let's explore a hypothetical: pretend republicans take control over the White House and legislative branch after the start of another colossal economic crisis (never mind which party is to blame for causing it).
How would republicans address it? Because we already have a precedent for it, let's pretend in this new economic crisis causes the loss of 8 million private jobs in under a year.
We already know what they WON'T do:
1) Extend unemployment benefits to the millions who lost their jobs to the crisis
2) Expand income tax credits for the poor to provide relief
3) Increase food stamp spending to the millions of children who already depend on the program (83% of funding for food stamps goes to households with one dependent living in the household).
4) Increase the federal minimum wage by a few dollars (18 million people make less than 10.10 per hour).
We do know what republicans would do:
1) Lower taxes on the wealthy. Of course, this measure has proven over and over to be useless in creating jobs for the lower classes because it is just easier for these "job creators" to keep most of the money they save rather than invest. There is a reason we have billionaires. Bush's tax cuts did jack shit of course. Job growth under Bush was pathetic and the Great Recession happened anyway in the last 4 months he was in office.
2) Deregulate the market. Regulations do very little to harm job growth. The BLS statistics prove that.
3) Uh, what else is there? Yeah, nothing. That's all republicans in power would do to fix the problem.
After the crisis of 2008, Obama extended unemployment benefits to the millions who abruptly lost their jobs and provided a solid tax cut to the middle class. This resulted in a boost to consumer spending that created jobs. 3 million private jobs alone were created from both of these measures (according to the CBO).
CBO Stimulus added up to 3.3M jobs - Josh Boak - POLITICO.com
Do republicans have better options on the table than that? No.
How would republicans address it? Because we already have a precedent for it, let's pretend in this new economic crisis causes the loss of 8 million private jobs in under a year.
We already know what they WON'T do:
1) Extend unemployment benefits to the millions who lost their jobs to the crisis
2) Expand income tax credits for the poor to provide relief
3) Increase food stamp spending to the millions of children who already depend on the program (83% of funding for food stamps goes to households with one dependent living in the household).
4) Increase the federal minimum wage by a few dollars (18 million people make less than 10.10 per hour).
We do know what republicans would do:
1) Lower taxes on the wealthy. Of course, this measure has proven over and over to be useless in creating jobs for the lower classes because it is just easier for these "job creators" to keep most of the money they save rather than invest. There is a reason we have billionaires. Bush's tax cuts did jack shit of course. Job growth under Bush was pathetic and the Great Recession happened anyway in the last 4 months he was in office.
2) Deregulate the market. Regulations do very little to harm job growth. The BLS statistics prove that.
3) Uh, what else is there? Yeah, nothing. That's all republicans in power would do to fix the problem.
After the crisis of 2008, Obama extended unemployment benefits to the millions who abruptly lost their jobs and provided a solid tax cut to the middle class. This resulted in a boost to consumer spending that created jobs. 3 million private jobs alone were created from both of these measures (according to the CBO).
CBO Stimulus added up to 3.3M jobs - Josh Boak - POLITICO.com
Do republicans have better options on the table than that? No.
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