How To Improve Our Economy?

My sister in law came up with a very good plan, somehow she figured that 700 billion could be split amoung the people, this would. after taxes give each one of us about 220,000.00$ which we could use to get out of debit, open saving, spend and all that would boost the economy, paid down our debit, improve jobs market, increase savings and generally answer all the problems they say are causing this situation. Sounded good to me. At least on the surface.

That the US is now in trouble economically is the inevitable result of a country that has been living beyond its means for a long time (increasingly spirraling debt, both government and individual, a laissez faire society where deregulation is king, etc) How do we solve America's problems? Taking realistic decisions that are evidence based would be a start. The next President is going to have to clear a hell of a mess and I can tell you its going to be painful. The era of buget deficit hawks will hopefully return, you know that word called 'balanced budgets'. So if we want to restore the US position, the next President will have to tax more and spend less to get our accounts back in order. One way of spending less is to reduce the military overreach that we are currently suffering: all empires in the past have fallen because they spent too much money on wars then had to tax heavily to pay for these wars which then in turned harmed their economies then their armies could not be paid for and thus this led to their decline. The US is not exempt from this historical truth, so the US needs to pare back its military spending and fix its economy if it wishes to enjoy future decades of dominance. But the next President will also need to explain to people that living on the never never is not an option. Some form of financial education in schools to equip future adults by teaching them how to manage their money would also be useful. Also banks will need to be much more tighty regulated to ensure that they don't lend crazily once more to people who cannot afford loans. In addition, the US should invest in research and development as the US has competitive advantage in this area (ie seeking alternative fuels, alternative energy sources, medicine, etc.) I'm sure there are other things the next President will want to think of, but it is late at night and my brain can only think of so much!

well to me we need to quit giving our money to other countries. But we need to feed our citizens first this country is slipping into another recession and we have plenty of people here who need the money. We have businesses going under,people homeless, people who cant feed their children and we are worried about other peoples children. Im not saying cant help but give to our people first.

How about instead of bailing out the banks...the government should divide that 700 billion dollars evenly between citizens in the US who are 18 and over. That would mean we would all get a check for about 200,000.00 We could use those checks to pay up mortgages (which would get the banks out of the red, since that is the reason they are folding anyway) We could buy cars (stimulates the car factories, making more money, creating more jobs, and stimulating the economy) We could pay off student loans (again, helps out the banks,pulls people out of debt so that they could pay their other bills, and makes a nice incentive for college graduates) We could Pay off other bills, credit cards, utilities, ect. (Putting again, even less stress on banks, and making the energy outlook better) Low income families could buy cars, work clothes,go back to school, and do other things that would help them become self sufficient (which would get people off welfare, stimulate the economy, and lower taxes) Elderly people and sick people could afford their medicine (bringing more jobs to the healthcare industry, put less stress on medicare and medicaid taxes, and create better health for Americans) Even if the money was spent on meaningless stuff, it would still cause a huge retail boom where employers would need to hire way more help and more products would need to me made to sell,and the economy would be helped. The economic stimulus that was sent out this year was only enough for most people to catch up on a bill or 2 and buy gas. AND a good percentage of people didnt even qualify for one. I bet if that 700 billion was given to Americans....instead of wealthy corporations, there would be a huge change.

Our economy is where it is because of the same thing that Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and Andrew Jackson warned us about. Central Banking. The Federal Reserve Bank maintains control of our currency, therefore manipulating it any way they want. No checks and balances, no congressional oversight, no public knowledge. They just change interest rates, inflate the dollar, and create financial bubbles at will, without question. Look up the banking quotes from Jefferson and Franklin, they knew exactly what would happen, and it is. Neither Obama or McCain is approaching this problem, and it is the real problem. Bailouts only buy time and in the long run the inflation caused by the printing of the 700$ billion would drive the cost of living up and within 5 years we would be right back in the hole, only more broke than before. STOP CENTRALIZED BANKING, ALLOW THE FREE MARKET TO RUN ITSELF. The times when Americans were wealthiest was when the market was free and government knew it's place.

recent, all most each person know that the United States economy is not as good as before ,and many companies are facing a bad condition .i am a chinese and even though i know little about USA and its economy ,i believe that the bad condition wiil better off someday ,the USA will still keep its leading not only in politicle but economy as well .

it could be a long time before we rise on the scale of countries again, particularly because everything we do affects our economy in some shape or form. What can we do to improve it though? Well, my idea is to start with the people. People need to create their own jobs instead of relying on businesses which may tank or simply decide to drop them and move out of the country. Each community has its own needs, and the bad economic circumstances are removing alot of things we previously had. If we're creative, we can certainly find something that could possibly grow. If a good amount of us worked on this, there's a good chance we could help the economy. MY little effort, to try to weather all this and build my own future is to micro-farm and work on my craftsmanship to make things people need. Tools, food...and have them to be cheaper than the stores so that people won't feel always so desperate. I was hoping to be able to have just enough to occasionally give a few things away to those who were hit the hardest in the economy. And I was also hoping that, if things continue to get bad in this area...that maybe my example will help others figure out their own ways to start from scratch and support themselves and those around us. Because the trickle down theory only works a certain percentage of the time, and then only if everything's going just so. Mostly, we need the people themselves. No people, no economy. This also leads to maybe people making new discoveries and having new innovative ideas that no one else thought of. I've got my own pet project I hope to complete someday before I die...I'm sure if people put their minds to it, and set their heart on self-reliance we'd all make it through much more smoothly than we dared hope.

Everyone keep blaming Bush when it is not his fault. His policies kept the economy going after 9/11 which was extremely hard to do. Several natural disasters hve also had an effect. One of the biggest problems has been the subprime mortgage situation and the ground work for that was laid with deregulation passed by congress and signed by Clinton in 1999 long before Bush was elected. Then it took both the mortgage companies pushing mortagages that people could not afford and people taking them up on them to cause that to reach the point of being such a huge problem. The price of oil has also contributed to the bad economy and that is not Bush's fault but is due mostly to the huge increase in demand in China and India while the demand in the US did not fall. Only when the price got so high that demand dropped did the price go down. Here Bush tried to help when he first took office by pushing to open ANWAR to drilling but Congress would not agree. If that had happened when he first wanted it, the price of gas would have been kept down by a slight amount. Food prices have gone up so drastically more from the use of corn for ethanol than from the cost of fuel. Both parties in Congress bowed down to extreme enviromentalist, who showed their usual like of foresight, to pass legislation to not only subsidize using corn for ethanol but to mandate it. It is not even environmentally sound. What small gain there is in cleaner air by using ethanol is far out weighed by increased water pollution from fertilyzer run off. It takes about 1000 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of ethanol from corn after all the steps are considered and water is rapidly becoming a scarce thing in many parts of the country. Corn is in far more food products than most people realize and is used for feed in many others. In addition land has been taken away from growing wheat to grow corn which has driven the price of bread up. Ethanol is really not a pratical or cheaper fuel but the environmentalists have been pushing it just like they brought the nuclear power industry in the US practically to a halt which meant that more power would come from coal and thus cause more air pollution. Now it is ethanol they are pushing with claims of making for cleaner air but which will lead to more water pollution without helping much on air pollution. The use of biofuels is causing a world wide food crisis leading to a drastic increase in starvation in many poorer countries. This may actually help the environmentalist achieve their goal since the ultimate problems of using up resourches and causing pollution are from over population so taking food away to large parts of the planet to use as fuel will cause starvation on a scale never seen before. But back to your question on the economy. What will help is for people to have a little common sense for a change and stop spending way over their heads on stuff they don't need, like cigerates, drinks, lattes, expensive shoes, cars, eating out several times a month, etc.

well I think it will be hard for us to be on top again but it can happen in my opioion one of the firsd things that needs to be done is to ban china and other countries from suppling our products and start suppling all amercian made products

i think it's going to take more than 4 years. it could take decades for us to be on top again.

One of the best suggestions I have read recently is for the U.S. to try, big time, to get into the "green" market. There are so many things that can help us as a nation become more energy efficient, and the good thing is you can't get someone from China to install solar collectors on your roof. The company that does that has to be in the U.S., and they have to hire U.S. workers. That is just one example, but it is possible. We can't ban all imports from other countries, but the fact is that the high cost of transportation, due to increased oil cost, may just actually make some of our manufacturing plants competitive again. If we stop letting Detroit tell us they can't make cars that get 50 mpg (Europe and Japan can and do), then we could put a lot of people back to work selling cars that people would love to own, rather than the expensive SUVS we now have. All of our bigger cities need improved transit systems and transporation alternatives. Again, the people run and maintain subways, trains, and bus systems aren't in India. They have to be here to do their jobs. Our sewage systems have been in place, in most cities, for close to a century. The infrastructure of hte U.S., subways, sewage systems, roads, etc., are all old, and many need to be fixed to be much more efficient. AGain, jobs for Americans. These are all things that employ us and help us save money on the cost of living too. I think we need a serious invest in America campaign, especially when the alternative is spending billions trying to prevent rival factions in Iraq from hurting and killing each other. It is not that I don't sympathize, but a bad decision is a bad decision, and it doesn't get better by not doing anything about it.