Candidates offer competing plans for job creation

[papau]

We get some discussion on the two jobs plans

Bush plan
•Stimulate growth in the economy and jobs by speeding up and extending indefinitely the temporary 2001 and 2003 income-tax cuts.
•Stimulate investment by extending indefinitely the temporary 2003 dividend and capital gains tax cuts.

Kerry plan
•Reduce the cost of doing business in the USA by cutting the corporate income tax from 35% to 33.25%.
•Stem the loss of U.S. jobs to overseas workers by ending tax breaks that make it more appealing to shift operations abroad, and offer a "corporate tax holiday" to encourage companies to shift overseas profits to the USA.
•Expand job and health care tax credits for manufacturers and small businesses that hire workers.
*Pledge to create 10 million new jobs in part by reforming the international tax system at an annual savings of $12 billion, applying that savings toward jobs creation- advocates the elimination of tax deferment on foreign income, closing tax loopholes by taxing companies on the overseas profits remaining after they paid taxes to foreign governments, and cutting the tax rate by 5 percent. Kerry will aim to "replace (the current tax code) with a simple system: companies will be taxed on their foreign subsidiaries profits just like they are taxed on their domestic profit," but not retroactively. Currently, American companies operating abroad do not have to pay U.S. taxes on foreign profits if they continue to invest the money abroad. In those cases, the companies have to pay only the taxes levied by the country in which they are operating.
* a one-year Multi-national Corporation "tax holiday," under which they could reinvest in the United States their built-up profits from foreign facilities at a temporary low tax rate of 10%,in addition to proposing a manufacturing "New Jobs Tax Credit" covering an employer's increased payroll costs for those that hired more workers. The credit would cover the employer's share of payroll taxes for the new workers.

Source: Bush and Kerry presidential campaigns




http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/2004-0...

Candidates offer competing plans for job creation
By Peronet Despeignes, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — President Bush and Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry are aggressively selling tax-cuts as part of their plans for ending the nation's longest hiring slump since the Great Depression, but it's not clear that either can cure what ails the U.S. job market.

The centerpiece of President Bush's plan is making permanent the more than $1.3 trillion in temporary income-tax cuts passed in 2001 and 2003. Most are set to phase out between now and 2010. Though most of the tax cuts were aimed at individuals, complexities of the tax code mean that many small businesses and corporations file under the rules governing individuals. Bush says tax cuts have lowered the cost of doing business in the USA and will eventually spur enough spending to force more hiring. Letting those tax rates go back up or even threatening to do so, he says, would only make the jobs slump worse.

"It's hard to run a business if you are unsure what the tax code is going to look like," he said Thursday in Nashua, N.H.

Kerry has offered a more targeted set of tax proposals: corporate income tax cuts, tax credits for companies that hire workers, a one-time low tax rate for companies that shift overseas income back to the USA, and an end to tax loopholes that Kerry says encourage the movement of jobs overseas. Kerry and his advisers say the package will make it cheaper for U.S. businesses to operate here and more expensive for them to shift work abroad.

Kerry's advisers say the package wouldn't increase the deficit, because revenue from the one-time tax rate and closing loopholes would pay for the tax cuts and credits. In contrast, they charge, Bush's tax cuts to extend the temporary tax cuts will inflate the deficit. Bush advisers counter that the stimulus to the economy and new revenue from the tax cuts will offset much of that.<snip>

[frylock]

1. shrub's three phase plan for job creation..

Phase 1: Collect underpants.
Phase 2: ???
Phase 3: Profits.

[phantom power]

2. Kerry's points seem reasonable

Still, I'd love to see him develop a public link between his support of the Apollo project and his jobs platform.

There's such a resonance with these issues. People are ready to hear about reducing dependence on foreign oil. They're ready to hear about job creation. They're obviously ready to hear about reducing our vulnerability to terrorism.

The Apollo project would hit all these simultaneously. Both practically, and psychologically.

He really ought to work it into his campaign. I think the nation is ready for a new "JFK Moment"

"We choose to do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard..."
--JFK