By Steve Forbes via Politico
As millions of Americans held their nose on tax day and sent their money to Washington, the House and the Senate were also focused on taxes. The Senate couldn’t muster enough support Monday to consider the “Buffett rule,” a new minimum tax rule that seems to be President Barack Obama’s top fiscal priority — if not distraction. It wouldn’t create a single job or help a single business. It’s divisive, and not worthy of being a part of a serious national conversation.
The House is due to vote Thursday on Eric Cantor’s Small Business Tax Cut Act, designed to help small businessmen and businesswomen with fewer than 500 employees expand and hire workers. To measure its impact and value, we must take a macro view of where the economy stands with consideration of election-year politics.
Real economic growth has been pathetic during the Obama presidency. Last year, the economy grew just 1.7 percent. By comparison, the Reagan recovery was spectacular — growing at 4.5 percent in 1983, with nearly 3.5 million jobs.
In just one month, September 1983, the Reagan economy added more than a million jobs, nearly as many as the economy grew for all 2011.
To match the amount of jobs created in the fourth year of the Reagan presidency, 1984, Obama’s economy would have to create 370,000 jobs per month for the rest of the year. Americans shouldn’t accept any less.
What is holding back growth? For one, the current Tax Code is a massive roadblock. It stifles the American dream by restricting people with complexity and unnecessarily high tax rates. It prevents true innovation and business startups.
The code, coupled with the highest corporate tax rate among industrialized nations, penalizes businesses and plagues workers and other citizens. It holds back our small-business job engines.
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