Economic Woes, Republican shortcomings:

	The job market and the economy did not fail on Sept. 11 2001.
	Those terrorist attacks only accelerated what had started
	just after the presidential elections in November of 2000.
	The American economy was already in a long downturn prior 
	to the Sept. 11 incidents, and it has been a downturn affecting
	skilled technical people fostered by, in the beginning,
	business to business initiatives failing to reach economic
	goals that may well have been highly over-anticipated considering
	the dramatically over valued dot.com's in conspicuous consumption 
	throughout the '90's.

	Recent reports, working to lighten the meaning and impact of the 
	present economic crisis, state figures like the rate of newly opened 
	unemployment claims dropping off dramatically since the first two 
	weeks after Sept. 11.  What is misleading in these reports and the 
	statistics kept and cited is that no one reports how many persons, 
	since the end of 2000 to present, have totally exhausted their 
	unemployment claims without finding a replacement position and 
	paycheck to handle their personal economic woes.  The problems with 
	the recent governmental actions to help push the economy away from 
	it's present recessive course is that everything done thus far has 
	only helped to 'ease' burdens for business.  Lowering interest rates 
	for prime lenders does nothing to help those displaced and without 
	economic means to pay their bills, it helps business, and mostly 
	BIG business.  It's a long wait for those interest rate cuts to tinkle 
	down.  The common man and woman, who have found themselves without a 
	decent paycheck to pay for their keep, might only see the fruit from 
	this tree of business plenty if the economy picks up before they have 
	also exhausted their unemployment compensation.  The chances of this 
	happening are appearing less and less as our economy starts to drag 
	the rest of the worlds economies down the drain with it.  The question 
	on peoples minds should be perhaps not how long the global recession 
	might last, but how far from a global depression we actually are.


		
			Isn't it a shame our country can allocate 
			billions for other countries, in a moments
			notice, but they take months to help keep
			taxpayers here from going bankrupt?! 


	To put this all in a timeframe;

	the reply below was recived from an e-mail sent to Jesse Helms, 
	President Bush, and Mr. Price on 12/9/01.  Only Mr. Price responded,
	on 12/21/01 (posted below).  This page was originally posted 1/9/02.
	From that point nothing, until 3/7/02, the house passes the economic 
	assitance bill, and then finally 3/8/02 the Senate passes it also.
	Now we wait on President Bush...who signed the bill on 3/9/02.

	Some pretty *quick* action from our representatives in office eh?
			
			A reply from:

                        The Honorable David E. Price
                            North Carolina, 4th
                        David.Price@mail.house.gov

As you may know, on October 24, the House passed H.R. 3090, the Economic
Security and Recovery Act.  While this measure gives $70 billion in tax
breaks to corporations, it provides only $9 billion to states for
unemployment benefits.  This is neither balanced nor fair.

During the debate on H.R. 3090,  I supported the Democratic alternative
that would have provided vital relief for laid-off workers, stimulated
the economy with temporary business and individual tax cuts, and made
immediate investments in homeland security.  It would have increased
unemployment benefits in every state by 25% and extended these benefits
for an additional 26 weeks.  Under the alternative, unemployed workers
also would have been provided assistance with COBRA premiums to allow
them to maintain their health insurance.  Unfortunately, this alternative
failed, and the House approved H.R. 3090.

On December 19, 2001, the Republican leadership brought to the floor H.R.
3529, a second economic stimulus bill that also consists mainly of
business tax cuts.  H.R. 3529 is a modified version of H.R. 3090, and
reflects changes that were made to remove or modify some of the most
egregious tax breaks for special interests and includes some provisions
that provide extended unemployment insurance benefits and refundable tax
credits for the purchase of health insurance by unemployed workers.

However, H.R. 3259 still fails to provide adequate assistance for workers
who have lost their jobs since the recession began in March and remains
too focused on giving tax cuts that will have little immediate impact on
the strength of the economy.  In fact, 87% of the benefits in the bill go
to corporations, businesses, and the well-to-do.  The combination of tax
cuts and spending increases in H.R. 3259 would cost $90 billion in 2002,
$76 billion in 2003 and $52 billion in 2004.  The cost over five years
would be $214 billion, plus $46 billion in additional debt service
expenses, a total of $260 billion. 

Since President Bush's earlier tax cut, combined with the effects of the
economic recession and the costs associated with homeland security and
the war on terrorism, have exhausted the budget surpluses that were
projected in 2001, the so-called stimulus package would be paid with
Social Security revenues.  With the budget slipping into the red, this
bill will drain resources that could have been used for debt reduction
and strengthening Medicare and Social Security.



 

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