I got my tax rebate today & the economy is great!
Fri May 09, 2008 at 10:27:16 AM PDT
After months of anticipation and mass mailings by the IRS to inform everyone that they, too, can waste paper with the best of them, my tax rebate showed up via direct deposit. I don't qualify for the big ones, but I got a nice little sum that is sure to help out a bit.
As the hype goes, this economic "stimulus package" is somehow supposed to help our economy out and solve all our problems. After all, we're all going to spend it on consumer goods, which is the surefire solution to everything?
On caveat: I live in Canada now. I'm going to spend all the money here.
This lunacy that some chump change will solve economic woes baffles me. All one needs to do is scan some headlines to know that the US faces some incredibly massive problems.
From Businessweek:
Are You Ready for Global Turmoil?
Recent headlines—Citigroup's layoffs, Iceland's sudden downturn, worldwide food shortages, etc.—suggest serious global turmoil is ahead.
From Financial Times:
On the pot-holed highway to hell
If anyone doubts the problems of US infrastructure, I suggest he or she take a flight to John F. Kennedy airport (braving the landing delay), ride a taxi on the pot-holed and congested Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and try to make a mobile phone call en route.
That should settle it, particularly for those who have experienced smooth flights, train rides and road travel, and speedy communications networks in, say, Beijing, Paris or Abu Dhabi recently. The gulf in public and private infrastructure is, to put it mildly, alarming for US competitiveness.
You might have expected that investing in US infrastructure would be a hot political topic this year. Well, no. Hillary Clinton spent the final week of her Indiana campaign standing on the back of a pick-up truck arguing for a temporary suspension of the "gas tax", the fuel duty that pays for highways.
You read correctly. Faced with the emptying of the Highway Trust Fund, established in 1956 as the US entered a period of growth and prosperity, Mrs Clinton suggested cutting its source of funds (which she claimed could be made up by a tax on oil companies). It was more important to give Americans a summer break from $4-per-gallon petrol.
Let's not forget oil prices hit $126 a barrel today.
So the country has a crumbling infrastructure (ask Minneapolis), severe budget shortfalls, potential food shortages, uncertain weather patterns, potentials for devastating droughts to hit the southeast and southwest, and a housing bubbles that is leaking billions of dollars of supposed "wealth" into thin air.
And my $328 was going to solve all that.
This diary isn't about offering solutions because frankly I'm stumped, but I'm not running for president either (Obama makes better speeches than me). I feel better about taking this money and spending it in a country where the minimum wage is higher, medical care is considered a right not a priviledge, and is the home of Terrance & Phillip.
What do you plan to do with your tax rebate? Will it stem the flow of value from your home? Will it simply pay down an overdue credit card?
Anyhow, since diaries are always given recommendations based on pootie pics, here's my kitten Butters:
And here's the first bear I saw this spring, about 20 km from my house:
Permalink | 37 comments