The Enid News and Eagle, Enid, OK

Opinion

Discussion

August 22, 2010

Maintaining Bush-era tax cuts is vital to creating jobs

Enid News and Eagle

President Barack Obama is traveling around parts of the country campaigning and fundraising, and he’s also touting what he says is the beginning of economic recovery.

Yet many hard-hit parts of the country know this economic recovery is elusive at best. There may be higher productivity in some areas that help the statistics, but that higher productivity just means fewer people are doing a lot more work for a lot less pay.

What is missing from this recovery is real job growth, and just about every American in both predominant political parties knows it.

The path to economic recovery really only can come through private-sector job growth. Unfortunately, that’s a statistic the president cannot point to as a success.

Obama’s policies thus far have not inspired private-sector job growth, and the expiration of Bush-era tax cuts expected to come at the end of the year means employers are not willing to start hiring until they see how these renewed tax increases will affect their businesses.

If the president wants to instill any kind of confidence in the economy from the private sector, it would be wise to start with renewing the Bush tax cuts. Unless he and Congress renew them, almost every working American is going to be hit with a massive across-the-board tax increase on their income and investments at the beginning of 2011.

Unless Obama and Congress promote extension of these tax cuts soon, more employers and investors will continue to lose confidence in the economy — and, that means no new job growth.

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