Economic Crapshoot Ahead
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on January 21st, 2009 5:39 am by HL
Economic Crapshoot Ahead
Finding wisdom on the question of economic stimulus may be Washington’s most important task in generations — short of major war decisions. President Barack Obama currently is proposing to spend about $850 billion over two years that he asserts is intended to stimulate the economy and thereby add 3-4 million jobs that otherwise would not exist. It is generally expected that Obama is lowballing it and that after Congress is finished, the level will be closer to $1.2 trillion. Without such efforts, it is asserted, we would face something on the dimensions of the Great Depression (during which America endured up to 24 percent unemployment and up to 13 percent contraction of gross domestic product in a single year). With the stimulus and other legislative and executive actions, people close to Obama hope that unemployment would top out at less than 10 percent and GDP contraction at about 5 percent.
Cynics Can’t Overlook History
The poignancy and historical importance of the moment cannot be overlooked – the inauguration of the first Black president. Slavery and Jim Crow have been America’s deepest scar, a sharp rebuke to our founding principles. For this reason, I have long regarded Martin Luther King, Jr., whose birthday was fittingly celebrated just the day before Barack Obama’s inauguration, as one of three indispensible Americans.
