Letters: Obama's jobs bill not the answer

Regarding "LI execs give tips to Obama on jobs", I disagree with the opinion of one of the individuals quoted, Martin Melkonian, an adjunct economics professor from Hofstra University, who recommended a Works Project Administration program. Increasing public sector jobs is not the solution.

First of all, when these roads are built and bridges repaired, what do you do with the people who are hired? Second, in the public sector there is far less accountability and productivity as compared to the private sector. There is no profit motive; therefore, there is no incentive to work productively. Third, the expensive and never-ending costs, such as medical and pension benefits that are incurred in the public sector, are not affordable as it is. Why would we want to increase this burden?

Instead, the federal government should implement a sliding tax code. For companies that move operations overseas, the tax rate should be higher, as a punitive measure. Companies that move operations back to the United States from overseas should be taxed at a lower rate. Payroll taxes should be lowered as an incentive to hire. Companies that hire and keep these new employees for 12 months should get a reduction in their tax rate.

It is not government's function to create jobs. But government should remove barriers and make it attractive for the private sector to do so.

Jeffrey Redelman, Melville
 

President Barack Obama's American Jobs Act is really Stimulus 2 by another name. Only the government could propose a plan in which it spends $450 billion and pays for it by not spending what was previously planned over the next 10 years!

If we managed our own finances in that fashion we would face bankruptcy. In private terms that would mean I could spend $1 million this year by paying for it by promising not to spend $1 million more than I previously planned to over the next 10 years.

Similarly I could gain 10 pounds now and justify it by saying I won't gain another 10 pounds over the next 10 years!

Diana Erbio, St. James
 

Your editorial on the president's $450-billion jobs proposal states that spending that money (on top of the billions that have already been spent) is the right way to go, and that "it should put money in people's pockets, boosting demand for goods and services." The fact that we have to take that money out of those very same pockets or borrow it to pay for all this spending doesn't seem to bother you.

If you are truly concerned about reviving this economy, why not do what worked under President Ronald Reagan? Cut back drastically on burdensome regulations, reform the tax code, and free up the private sector which, in the end, is the only true source of wealth creation in this country.

Arthur Wellikoff, Malverne